Passage of landmark sales tax fairness legislation during our annual fly-in last year is a perfect example. Personal stories from 30 states delivered a powerful message on the need to level the playing field between brick-and-mortar and online retailers, and ultimately had a significant impact that led to congressional action.

This year, we are making one change to reflect the idea that we are all advocates. NRF’s annual fly-in has been known for more than 80 years as the Washington Leadership Conference. Its new name – Retail Advocates Summit – reinforces the original mission and purpose: retailers who are passionate about policies they believe in can come to Washington to be advocates for change. It takes a broad coalition, from retailers large and small, to send a loud and clear message to Washington on the issues that matter to our industry.

Congress makes decisions everyday that directly impact retail. Retail Advocates Summit is your chance to educate elected officials and have a say about the issues affecting your bottom line. Now is the time to make your voice heard. Join us this July on Capitol Hill and be an advocate for retail.

We asked a few of our LP Advisory Council members to weigh in on what their top priorities are for 2014. Three different retailers, three different answers. But in our unofficial small survey, we found one common theme — people.

Roundtable of retail loss prevention professionals at the 2013 Loss Prevention Conference & EXPO.

Steve Ippolito, director of loss prevention, Talbots

Our top priority is two-fold. Reducing shrink is always a priority, but the No. 1 priority in our company is always the safety of our associates and customers, so we’re focusing efforts on making sure all of our LP programs address how to keep people safe in the world we live in today. We’ve put a complete policy in place about how to handle what we call an “active incident,” not just an active shooter, and that will continue to evolve this year.

Joan Manson, vice president of loss prevention, payroll, benefits and legal, The Container Store

It’s hard to state just one, but among our top priorities is ongoing employee education and awareness given our employees’ integral role in helping us meet all of our loss prevention goals. We’re updating our employee training program to support our stores and ensure they have the tools they need to assist us in preventing losses. Part of that is developing additional exception reports for our store management teams. This will help increase awareness for store managers and ensure they’re well-trained on point of sale and our ongoing compliance efforts. We also want to continue to invest in our new and existing stores to ensure they have the very best digital recording technology.

Charles Delgado, vice president of asset protection, Meijer

As we move through 2014, we’re squarely focused on reducing shrink and increasing profitability. Shrink, whether operational or transactional, undermines sales, so creating a formidable culture of shrink awareness is a top priority.We’ll do this by leveraging technology, along with training and development. Internet protocol video, enhanced analytics and exception-based reporting will quickly identify patterns of loss and enable our team to target problematic activity efficientl­­­y. Training and development will fuel our team for current and future productivity to support the organization and address the fluid patterns and trends of theft, fraud and overall shrink.

How do your team’s priorities compare to this sampling? We’d love to hear what your goals are for 2014, so we’re continuing the conversation in our Retail Loss Prevention Professionals Group on LinkedIn. Log in to join the conversation and connect with some of your retail LP peers before the conference, June 11-13 in Fort Lauderdale.

We reached out to Macy’s recruiting team to find out. Here are eight ways to make a meaningful “virtual” connection with  recruiters:

Macy’s Manager of College Relations Dara Silverglate at Retail’s BIG Show Student Program

1. Introduce yourself. At our upcoming Virtual Career Fair, candidates will have eight minutes to chat with a recruiter, so each minute is valuable. Taking the initiative to start the conversation is a great way to get a recruiter’s attention.
2. Have your elevator pitch ready. You’ve got 30 seconds to sell yourself in order to land the job of your dreams – what do you say? Start by telling the recruiter who you are, what you do, and exactly why you’re the candidate they should hire. A well-delivered elevator pitch could turn into an elevator ride to your dream job.
3. Plan questions to ask ahead of time. Asking questions is a clear indication of interest. A common mistake job seekers make – both virtually and “in real life” – is not taking the opportunity to ask a potential employer questions about their company and specific roles.
4. Share your skills and interests. Do you have strong math skills? Are you interested in digital retail and e-commerce? Would you like to build your leadership skills? Tell the recruiter! Sharing your strengths and opportunities to grow will allow the recruiter to determine which role in their company is the best fit for you.
5. Research, research, research. Go beyond a company’s corporate website to learn more about a prospective employer. Many retailers – including Macy’s – share career information and advice via their Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn accounts. The more you know about an employer and the career opportunities they offer, the better.
6. Be passionate, positive and enthusiastic. While you don’t have to end every sentence with an exclamation point, genuinely expressing to a recruiter how excited you are about the chance to connect will go a long way.
7. Keep it professional. Written communication says a lot about your professionalism and experience. Casual abbreviations like LOL, smiley faces and emoticons could be a #dealbreaker.
8. Follow up after the event or interaction. Even if it’s as simple as a “thank you,” say something to seal the deal, and let the recruiter know you valued the opportunity to speak with them. Are you on LinkedIn? Share your contact details and stay connected.

Overall, the best way to successfully connect with a recruiter is to adequately communicate who you are and why you’re the perfect match for a particular company. And, don’t forget to take advantage of virtual interactions by writing out your introduction, elevator pitch and questions in advance.

Want to know if these tips will work? Test them out on April 2 at NRF’s second Virtual Career Fair. A dozen top retailers – Bridgestone, Gordmans, H-E-B, HSN, IKEA, J. C. Penney, Kmart, Macy’s, Neiman Marcus, Nordstrom, Total Wine & More and Walgreens – have signed on to chat with job seekers and hire for summer internships and entry-level positions. Registration is free and open to any student or young professional across the country.

Here’s my recap – in 140 character bites from the Twitterverse.

On targeting Millennials:

The average millennial owns 7 devices. #IRCE #sxsw

— Sara Clarke (@seclarke) March 11, 2014

#millennials are forcing new sales and service models. need to be where they are at: online and face2face where they frequent. #irce #sxsw

— amanda grosgebauer (@ag_spotstrat) March 11, 2014

On consumers and the second screen experience:

"90% of people will recommend a brand after they've had a social interaction with that brand." @ranvir @getchute #OOHFuture #acsxsw #sxsw

— Laurie Keith (@lauriekeith) March 10, 2014

More than 84% of American tablet & smartphone owners use their devices while watching TV. #2ndScreen http://t.co/QgHRQaoD8p

— DanDawes (@DanDawes) March 11, 2014

#2ndscreen "Gotta hit targeting, reach, and frequency AND reporting, then you can nail monetization and ad buys" @gconsig #sxsw

— Mass Relevance (@massrelevance) March 8, 2014

On customer experience:

Brand strategy = customer experience strategy. You can't market your way out of a mediocre customer experience. Redefine your focus. #yodel

— Nikki Rappaport (@nikkirap) March 11, 2014

"Digital & physical retail need to be on the same team"… Entirely true. It's the key to 'holistic' retail success. #digistore #SXSW

— Alex Blaney (@hitono) March 9, 2014

On social:

personal shopping recommendations via Instragram trends, this is the year to buy on Instagram @whatupwilly #retailtech

— Kim Geralds (@kimgeralds) March 9, 2014

Both Lowe's and GE say Vine & Instagram work informs their TV and ad strategies. #mpomma

— S. Schierholz (@schierholz) March 7, 2014

On leveraging new tech:

Future of wearable tech and brands – Wearable device recognises you have run 10 miles. Auto delivers gatorade to your door #DoBrands #Sxswi

— Karen Fewell (@DigitalBlonde) March 7, 2014

On digital advertising:

New line of hair care brand has an digital billboard at a train station, reacts to train arriving. #OOHFuture http://t.co/beXwhOU7NF

— Robert Freeman (@robertfreeman2) March 10, 2014

People process visual content online 60,000 times faster than text. #OOHFuture #SXSW14

— dan pankraz (@danpankraz) March 11, 2014

Right place, right time, right person, right message, that is the future of successful, effective omnichannel marketing. #OOHFuture

— Pam Krengel (@pkrengel) March 10, 2014

On innovation (in lab form or otherwise):

Now your iPhone can produce smells … and the first scent they picked was bacon. #scentee #SXSW http://t.co/kfupS2fmZR

— Rohit Bhargava (@rohitbhargava) March 10, 2014

Leaving #SXSW & reminded of how innovative retailers already are. Thank you @BestBuy & @BenefitBeauty. http://t.co/YYOHgr8Sob

— Sarah Neale Rand (@SarahNRand) March 10, 2014

New Allsaints CEO instilled 100-day sprints for projects. Agility needs to be important to those at the top. #retailtech #SXSW

— esther s. kim (@e5thelove) March 9, 2014

Which topics did I miss? Tweet me at @mcaselittle or add your takeaways in the comments. Until next year, South by!

“Innovation” might be a buzz word, but it’s also big business. Retailers like Nordstrom and Walmart are investing in innovation labs to spark fresh thinking in their organizations, while some companies encourage employees to spend time on side projects to spur creativity and tap into personal passions. But in the business world, an idea doesn’t have much of an impact until it’s executed, so how do you bring your big ideas to life?

At Retail’s BIG Show in January, Nathan Martin from Pittsburgh innovation studio Deeplocal discussed his team’s creative process with Nick Parish of Contagious Communications. Deeplocal is uniquely suited to the discussion. The team has created a number of buzz-worthy projects, each marked by a whimsical, physical and unexpected element — a mind-powered bike for Toyota, the first telerobotic first pitch in baseball for Google or the Chalkbot they did for the Nike during the Tour de France a few years back. Take a look and you’ll see what we mean.

So to follow up from the show in January, we wanted to share a few tips from Martin to give you the nudge you need to develop and execute your big ideas.

• Get your idea out into the world. This is the first step, and sometimes the hardest hump to get over. Share and act on it quickly before you over-think it on your own. In Martin’s world, delightfully uncommon ideas are executed in a matter of weeks, so there’s no turning back on them. This leads us to the second tip.
• It’s good to be challenged. It takes courage to put your ideas out there, but it’s ultimately challenges that make your organization stronger. Once it’s out there in the world, others will collaborate and your creation will grow and change. Don’t fight it, but rather look at it as a chance to see opportunities and things you may have missed.
• Be honest about your idea. You might think it’s brilliant, but tell your idea to someone who hasn’t heard anything about it. “Eventually I call my dad and explain it to him. It’s a great litmus test. If he doesn’t get it, we have to work on it some more,” Martin said.

When it comes to generating great ideas, remember these things:

• Everyone is creative. A great project team isn’t just made up of typical creatives. Bring in outsiders.
• Rethink the brainstorm. Brainstorming isn’t about throwing clever people in a room. Martin described Deeplocal’s process as gathering a team (anyone who has perspective on the problem regardless of their role), then focusing on recording assets, information or trends that are relevant to the problem.
• Let people come up with ideas in their own way. Genius may not strike in a meeting. After group collaboration, Martin’s team goes off on their own to get the creative juices flowing however it works for each of them — in the shower or on a morning run.
• Great ideas are about the experience – not the technology.  This little nugget was also echoed by Jack Dorsey, Twitter co-founder and Square CEO, at his BIG Show keynote presentation.

Whether you’ve got ideas about how to better your department, improve your bottom line, enhance your customer experience or even revolutionize the way the whole world thinks about commerce, keep these things in mind, and you’ll be on your way. And let us know how your BIG Show-inspired idea turns out.

Consumers don’t think about shopping and say, “I want an omnichannel experience.” But their expectation is that shopping will be seamless between stores and devices. So if omnichannel is an industry-created term, what does it mean?

Kohl’s SVP of E-commerce Mike Molitor (left) talks supply chain processes and standards for omnichannel fulfillment with Hudson Bay’s Dan C. Smith, Macy’s Peter Longo and GS1′s Bob Carpenter.

At Retail’s BIG Show, executives from Macy’s, Kohl’s, Hudson Bay and GS1 tried to answer that question. While retailers might have their own approaches to achieving a seamless experience, each agreed that the answer relies on efficient and accurate logistics. And technology is the key to allowing retailers, suppliers and distribution networks – the full scope of the retail supply chain – to be on the same page.

As Kohl’s Senior Vice President of E-commerce Mike Molitor explained, there is no single omnichannel manual. “It’s been a little bit of a ‘wild wild west,’ ” he said. “The process of revamping product information system relies on important pieces of information from suppliers.” But retailers are setting their own standards and requirements, such as RFID, which could put stress on suppliers. One-off solutions can get in the way of an environment that approaches and resolves supply chain issues universally, Molitor emphasized.

In a global supply chain, communication and community between retailers and suppliers are paramount. To achieve synchronicity, Macy’s President of Logistics and Operations Peter Longo suggested that the relationship could be transformed with this idea: that the end goal should be for merchandise to land in a customer’s home rather than on store shelves. Longo said loyalty can be lost quickly if products aren’t where a consumer wants them, when they want them and how they want them. In a world where more retailers are leveraging buy online/pickup-in-store, inaccuracies could mean irreparable customer relationships.

There is a laundry list of supply chain to-dos for retailers. While there will always be demands to improve the customer experience, “there is a bigger need to get everyone on the same page internally,” Hudson Bay Trading Company CIO Dan Smith said. Perhaps “omnichannel” can be viewed in a way that Longo put it: the complete integration of promotion, packaging, merchandising and pricing to create a unified experience, in-store and online. Certainly easier said than done.

 Who’s who

Retail’s BIG Show 2014 attendees make their way to the keynotes. This year’s event saw record attendance.

• 30,000 registrants
• 86 countries represented
• 1,652 people from Brazil, the most-represented foreign country. Canada was the second largest group (1,124).
• 242 people in the largest single international delegation, again from Brazil
• 278 speakers
• 1 former U.S. President

Calories in

• 9,600 Krispy Kreme doughnuts served
• 923 gallons of coffee or 14,768 cups of coffee served
• 75,000-plus bottles of water served

Calories out

• 15,400 chairs
• 200 miles walked by just five members of NRF’s logistics team
• 10 miles per day: the average mileage for an NRF logistics team member
• 6 city blocks and one-third of a mile: the length of the Javits Convention Center from end to end

Show floor stats

• 555 exhibiting companies
• 205,000 net square feet of already sold for next year’s show

More knowledge more power

• 8,600 mobile app downloads
• 113 educational sessions
• 100 hours of content

Lost and (sometimes) found

• 5 credit cards (unclaimed cards are shredded)
• 4 cell phones
• 4 driver’s licenses
• 2 backpacks
• 1 wedding band (Note: If it’s yours, call Javits Security at (212) 216-2196!)

Retail’s BIG Show has grown quickly over the last few years. And every year after the event, our team wonders how we could possibly pull off a bigger and better show. But I’m proud to say that every year we have succeeded. It’s inspiring to see how the BIG Show brings innovators together, sparks partnerships and helps jump start the year for retailers. It’s an honor to serve this great industry at this annual event and throughout the year.

So what could be better in 2015?  

New in 2015

• 1 additional EXPO day (open on Sunday)
• 17,500 additional square feet of EXPO hall space
• 1 retail industry gala

Watch the video below for a two-minute look at this year’s show. Congratulations to our team, attendees, sponsors and exhibitors on a great BIG Show. We’ll see you next year.

Our friends at digital analytics agency Pointmarc took a deep dive into our social data and created this great infographic that tracks the buzz from the start of the show Saturday, January 11 to its close on Wednesday, January 15.

We think you’ll find it pretty interesting–and you can even compare this final wrap up to a mid-event snapshot from Tuesday. But this isn’t the end of #nrf14 talk. Join in the conversation to tell us what you learned at the show!

A big thank you to Pointmarc for tracking our social stats! You can find out more about their marketing insight and analytics platform instrumentation services here.

Dorsey says a receipt is not just a piece of paper or an email – it’s a powerful communication tool that should be used to add value and keep customers coming back whether it’s online or in the store.

“What can we build into this canvas that’s actually valuable, that’s independent of the product you just sold?” Dorsey asked as this morning on the final day of Retail’s BIG Show.

Dorsey described Square’s Square Wallet as a receipt in the form of an application. Customers who walk into a Square Wallet merchant can be greeted by name, get VIP service and pay without ever taking their phone out of their pocket.

“That’s what great technology allows,” Dorsey said. “It allows for experience. It allows for the mechanical aspects of what we do every day to completely disappear.”

Dorsey was joined onstage by HSNi CEO Mindy Grossman, who moderated a question-and-answer session on Square’s recent “Let’s Talk” campaign. Watch the video below for more about Dorsey’s philosophy on technology and how retail is revitalizing cities across America.

As part of his keynote address at Retail’s BIG Show this week, Jacobs walked onto the stage in a T-shirt that reads “Champions of Optimism.” And that’s not just a catchy fashion statement – it’s a way of life for the retail CEO. Many people ask Jacobs and his brother why they feel the need to focus on these altruistic values within their company culture. Well, here’s the backstory.