The Voice of Retail

Welcome to the The Voice of Retail , I’m your host Michael LeBlanc, and this podcast is brought to you in conjunction with Retail Council of Canada. What’s a COVID-era trend and what’s here to stay? Amar Singh is the Senior Director in Consulting at the marketing research company, Kantar. As a retail consultant who specializes in macroeconomics and forecasting, Amar has invaluable insights on the...

Welcome to the The Voice of Retail , I’m your host Michael LeBlanc, and this podcast is brought to you in conjunction with Retail Council of Canada. Roots’ Chief Financial Officer, Mona Kennedy, is coming out of the pandemic with renewed appreciation   for the company’s built-in resilience.  From the front lines to the head office, Roots’ company culture champions agility and values their people a...

Welcome to the The Voice of Retail , I’m your host Michael LeBlanc, and this podcast is brought to you in conjunction with Retail Council of Canada.   With vaccination rates steadily on the rise, retailers are now facing the reality of business after lockdowns. So, what’s going to be different? Today, I dive into brick and mortar retail trends with Steve Hart , the founder and CEO of the retail ar...

Welcome to the The Voice of Retail , I’m your host Michael LeBlanc, and this podcast is brought to you in conjunction with Retail Council of Canada. Award wining senior agency leader and strategic digital marketer with one of Canada’s premier global digital agencies, Nasser Sahlool , Vice President of Client Strategy at DAC group takes us through his observations of consumer behaviour, purpose and...

Welcome to the The Voice of Retail , I’m your host Michael LeBlanc, and this podcast is brought to you in conjunction with Retail Council of Canada. Leadership Coach, Keynote Speaker and author, Likky Lavji can speak to the power of vulnerability and trust in leadership. When it comes to being a business leader and building incredibly cohesive teams, Likky is inviting the world to get familiar wit...

Welcome to the The Voice of Retail , I’m your host Michael LeBlanc, and this podcast is brought to you in conjunction with Retail Council of Canada. The COVID era has offered the unique opportunity to reflect on what motivates consumers every-day decisions. Whether we’re creatures of habit or hungry for novelty, the pandemic has been a foil to some of our most staunch consumer behaviours - and com...

Welcome to the The Voice of Retail , I’m your host Michael LeBlanc, and this podcast is brought to you in conjunction with Retail Council of Canada. The emergence of COVID-19 has had far-reaching and wide-ranging impacts on the Canadian economy. Seventeen months into the pandemic, Equifax has a depth of data on the unique ways that Canadians, from individual households to entire industries, have b...

Welcome to the The Voice of Retail , I’m your host Michael LeBlanc, and this podcast is brought to you in conjunction with Retail Council of Canada. In this episode, I sit down with friend and fellow Top 100 Retail Influencer , Carl Boutet to talk about resilience and relevance in retail.  Carl calls on his depth of experience and research to flesh out the transformations that retail has undergone...

Welcome to the The Voice of Retail , I’m your host Michael LeBlanc, and this podcast is brought to you in conjunction with Retail Council of Canada. The COVID era has put retail transformation under the spotlights, and no one better to tap Into their experience and insights on the road left behind and the path ahead then Retail Transformation Specialist and fellow Top 100 Global Retail Influencer...

Welcome to the The Voice of Retail , I’m your host Michael LeBlanc, and this podcast is brought to you in conjunction with Retail Council of Canada. The evolving public health crisis has had a unique impact on Canadian cannabis retailers. Industry experts Darren Bondar , President + CEO of Spiritleaf , and Eleanor Lynch , COO of Kiaro reflect on the past year, the opportunities it has created, and...

Welcome to the The Voice of Retail , I’m your host Michael LeBlanc, and this podcast is brought to you in conjunction with Retail Council of Canada. As the Head of Trends at Insider Trends , Cate Trotter has her hand on the pulse of the future of retail success. In this interview, with Cate from her offices in London, she offers her insight and experience on everything from Retail Safaris and tren...

Welcome to the The Voice of Retail , I’m your host Michael LeBlanc, and this podcast is brought to you in conjunction with Retail Council of Canada. I’m thrilled to be celebrating my 200th episode by sitting down with Clint Mahlman , the President and COO at London Drugs . From growing up in the stores to leading the company through a global pandemic, Clint reflects on the ‘DNA of being different,...

Welcome to the The Voice of Retail , I’m your host Michael LeBlanc, and this podcast is brought to you in conjunction with Retail Council of Canada. We’re delving into the backbone of the retail cannabis industry with Albert Kim , CEO of Vancouver’s Greenline POS .   With a fresh vantage point starting just prior to legalization Albert positioned his offering precisely to fill the need of simple t...

Welcome to the The Voice of Retail , I’m your host Michael LeBlanc, and this podcast is brought to you in conjunction with Retail Council of Canada. In this special format bonus episode I meet Isaac Watson , Vice President, Retail, Fire and Flower a leading, technology-powered, adult-use cannabis retailer.  A retail veteran since joining F&F in April of 2018, he has built and led teams to open and...

Welcome to the The Voice of Retail , I’m your host Michael LeBlanc, and this podcast is brought to you in conjunction with Retail Council of Canada.   In this episode, I interview the CEO of McCarthy Uniforms, Vanessa Iarocci. She tells us about adapting to the demands of modern retailing and responding to both the challenges and opportunities that COVID-19 has brought to the business. With a back...

Welcome to the The Voice of Retail , I’m your host Michael LeBlanc, and this podcast is brought to you in conjunction with Retail Council of Canada. In this special format bonus episode I meet Clint G. Seukeran, the owner of Ganjika House, Brampton Ontario’s first legal cannabis dispensary, which opened its doors to the public on April 1 2019.  Clint  is a speaker at the RCC Retail Cannabis Forum...

Welcome to the The Voice of Retail , I’m your host Michael LeBlanc, and this podcast is brought to you in conjunction with Retail Council of Canada. In this episode I’m connecting with John Porter , Founder & CEO, BarterPay®.   We catch up and explore the innovative and exciting world of modern barter,  a system that has taken the age-old practice of one-to-one bartering and transformed it into a...

Welcome to the The Voice of Retail , I’m your host Michael LeBlanc, and this podcast is brought to you in conjunction with Retail Council of Canada. In this episode I’m in Chicago welcoming back Kristina Rogers, Global Consumer Industries Leader, Retail for EY and we catch up talking about the tradecraft of global consulting in the COVID era and beyond, lesson learned and observed advising clients...

Welcome to the The Voice of Retail , I’m your host Michael LeBlanc, and this podcast is brought to you in conjunction with Retail Council of Canada. In this episode I’m in Montreal to meet Antoine Amiel, President and CEO at New Look Vision Group.  An international executive with over 25 years in the eye glass industry, Antoine shares his vision for the category and his over 400 retail stores.  Le...

Welcome to the The Voice of Retail , I’m your host Michael LeBlanc, and this podcast is brought to you in conjunction with Retail Council of Canada. In this episode, I explore the latest trends and technologies in retail loss prevention with my guest David Almasi, Vice President Canada and International Markets at 3SI Security Systems, the world leader in asset protection systems including their s...

Welcome to the The Voice of Retail , I’m your host Michael LeBlanc, and this podcast is brought to you in conjunction with Retail Council of Canada. In this episode, I welcome back to the podcast Michele Sexsmith, Senior Vice President and Practice Leader, Retail, Real Estate and Entertainment Sectors, Environics Analytics.  We catch up after a tumultuous year in retail that has shaken up where an...

Welcome to the The Voice of Retail , I’m your host Michael LeBlanc, and this podcast is brought to you in conjunction with Retail Council of Canada. Latest episode of The Voice of Retail  #podcast  is live. In this special edition episode, I join  David Poirier , CEO at  The Poirier Group , for a live and interactive discussion on the state of retail and the structural implications of the COVID er...

Welcome to the The Voice of Retail , I’m your host Michael LeBlanc, and this podcast is brought to you in conjunction with Retail Council of Canada. In this episode we get the podcast on the rails with our special guest Dan Bresolin – Vice President – Intermodal, CN.  With 20 years of experience in international and domestic supply chain, and with the movement of goods around the world and through...

Welcome to the The Voice of Retail , I’m your host Michael LeBlanc, and this podcast is brought to you in conjunction with Retail Council of Canada. In this episode, I’m in Dallas, Texas welcoming back to the podcast top retail strategist, best selling author and my Remarkable Retail podcast co-host Steve Dennis!  We're back on the mic together talking about the launch of the 2nd edition of his be...

Welcome to the The Voice of Retail , I’m your host Michael LeBlanc, and this podcast is brought to you in conjunction with Retail Council of Canada. In this episode, I’m in Calgary with one of the top economists and big picture thinkers in Canada, Jack Mintz , President’s Fellow of the School of Public Policy at the University of Calgary , Order of Canada recipient as well as recipient of the Quee...