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Welcome to the Bloomberg Markets Podcast. I'm Paul Sweeney, alongside my co host Matt Miller.
Every business day we bring you interviews from CEOs, market pros, and Bloomberg experts, along with essential market moven News.
Find the Bloomberg Markets Podcast called Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to podcasts, and at Bloomberg dot com slash podcast. All right, let's get a sense here of kind of how this is playing out terms of retail sales holiday shopping. I'd tell you my train was pretty full today with people. They were not coming into work. I think they were coming into shop a great Let's check in with Julie Van Allen. She's a chief revenue officer Rocketent. Julie, thanks
so much for joining us here on Zoom. Here, you guys see kind of retail sales at the store level and you kind of aggregated it up to kind of some big macro call here. How do you think the holiday shopping season is going to unwind this year because there's probably there's some stress on the consumer out there.
Yeah, well, I got to tell you, guys, I am so excited with what I woke up to see today. From a trend standpoint on our site, what we're seeing is that this is I think the technical term has to be just a thoroughly bonkers year in terms of retailers and brands competing for consumer dollars in the term in the form of promotions on their own sites and then layering on cash back and other incentives and on
the consumer front. Ready this morning, we'll see a significant increase in shopping trips year over year.
Hey, Julie, just remind the world what Racketin does and how you guys, cause you've got a bunch of stores you log on write consumers and then get deals. Those stores pay you right for sending them shoppers. Just remind us and remind us how big your network is in terms of members.
Yeah, we have seventeen million shoppers shopping on the Racketen site with about four thousand partner stores. So those retailers and brands join racketin to attract the shoppers that are excited and rewarded to shop through Racketin's platform to get cash back on the stores that they love so much.
So one of the things I wonder when I'm talking retail is, what do you compare what you're seeing today with Is it going back to twenty nineteen pre pandemic or is it from the peak kind of coming off the pandemic. Give us some perspective so that we get a real idea of how healthy the consumer is or there or not. Retailers are feeling some pain because they're offering higher incentives than they were before.
It's a great question, and I think it comes down to it being a very different year this year than it has been for the last two because from a consumer standpoint, coming out of COVID, there were a lot of people who saved up dollars right So for the last couple of years, there was a push a pull forward of the holiday shopping season, where consumers were shopping starting in October for gifting and retailers met them where they were, and there was a spread of the amount
of offers that were in market and discounts throughout the year. This year is a very different year because retailers knew that consumers had been patiently waiting given the different economic conditions coming into this year. So it's very very consolidated around Black Friday, Cyber Monday, and essentially really the next five days. So yeah, I mean, it's just a very
different look and feel this year. That said, I think brands are always cognizant about profitability, and so while we know that we need to compete for the consumer dollars, especially in a year like this year, so everyone's going to be super promotional right now, the smart brands think about how to pivot and change that up a little bit as we get into December.
Hey, Julie, is there any kind of go to category here or gift that is going to drive this year's or's something along electronics front?
What are people buying?
You're buying platform ugs, aren't you buying.
Of course, right, that's the new thing. Sorry, I love an UG, that's what I want.
Yeah, So, I mean right now we have over eight hundred brands on our site offering twelve percent cash back on top of the amazing deals they're already offering. And I can tell you from categories that we're already seeing growth coming out of department stores. Is one, health and beauty. Big marketplaces, so think like Walmart and Target. And I think what you can tie that to is that the consumer isn't just looking for discretionary gifting spend, it's also
how to get the best deals on essentials. Footwear to the ugs is up, and then poor retailers in the luxury space even versus yesterday, up pretty significantly, which shows you what we I think already knew, which is that consumers are waiting to make those big discretionary buys for when they know the discounts and the incentives will be highest. And then, probably most interestingly, the unconventional category of travel is up high, which again high price point consumers waiting for those deals.
It feels like we're all waiting for discounts more now.
Yeah, again, Paul, I think we've been trained that way.
Yeah, but it felt like the retailer companies were in the driver's seat, Julie for a while. And it feels like it's been reversing because it feels like consumers are more and more pinch We had a great story about even those making like one hundred thousand dollars out, they're kind of trading down and being a lot more cautious when it comes to shopping. And I feel like so many retailers have come out right, Walmart and among them, but even you know, I feel like some higher end
have run into some trouble here. So it does feel like increasingly all consumers are feeling a bit pinched, certainly.
I mean core inflation, student loan debt, repayments, I mean, there's something affects everybody, right, and it just drives concerns. This year was definitely a year that we knew that consumers were holding on to their dollars. It's definitely different than the last couple of years. But that said, you know, it's not sustainable for retailers and brands to be this
promotional all year. That's why we have the partners that we do, because things like cash back can be a great incentive for brands to help create rewards for shoppers to even pay full price as we exit this highly promotional period.
Hey, Julie, when I ack my five hours of radio today, I will walk to Penn Station and I won't be on Fifth Avenue. I walk down Madison Avenue and I pass a lot of I pass by, I don't go in. I pass by a lot of luxury brand stores. How's luxury these days?
Luxury is a really interesting category, and like I said, we see that up today. But I think once you dig a little bit deeper into the luxury shopper, the core luxury high end shoppers are not the ones that are driving growth right now from what we see. It's not to say that they won't come back and spend, but a lot of those super high end handbags are a little bit more expensive this year than they used
to be. And I think what you see is a more aspirational shopper looking at buying or making these purchases
that are an investment for them. So a younger, more aspirational shopper, which really creates an interesting pathway for these brands to welcome new and exciting shoppers to their brands buying the high end goods, but they're also carving off parts of their businesses like beauty to be more discount driven, to be more promotional in terms of price points, in order to usher the new shoppers their way.
So, Julie, too early to kind of come out and say, right, this is going to be the winner for this holiday shopping season, because it sounds like from what you say, we're going to get a good feel of consumer shopping in the next week or so, and then it might trail off a little bit. So thirty seconds, who do you think is going to be the winner?
I mean, everyone's going to be the winner if they know how to pivot. I think that's at the end of the day, We're going to see a tremendous amount of shopping happening over the next couple of days. But then what happens after that? Are there inventory gluts that need to be offloaded through incentives? Do we need to incentivize folks to get in store through buy online, pickup in store. It's all about reaction.
Hi, Julie, thank you so much for joining us. Juli Van Allen, she's a chief revenue officer Racketon.
You're listening to the team. Ken's her live program Bloomberg Markets weekdays at ten am Eastern on Bloomberg dot Com, the iHeartRadio app, and the Bloomberg Business App, or listen on demand wherever you get your podcasts.
Paul, you know, we talk so much about people continuing to spend on experiences rather than buy stuff, and I feel like our next guest has a great window into all of that. So Dexol Live it's the hospitality partner
to Global Venues. They've had a lot going on this year, everything from hosting the Formula one Miami Grand Prix at hard Rocks Stadium, the twenty twenty three MLB All Star Game at Seattle's t Mobile Park, to events at convention centers, cultural attractions, and airport lounge business, which if you've been to an airport lounge, they are packed.
Yep, they are all right.
So let's get to it with us. As Blinda Oakley CEO, it's Adexhi Live joining us on zoom on this Friday. Great to have you here, Belinda. You know, your first year on the job, what's that been like?
Oh hi everyone, Hi Carol, high Poul and happy Thanksgiving. You know, the first year has been a whirlwind, but what a great time to be in the live events business. I think, as you mentioned, the focus on experience continues to lead people back to those packed environments, those environments where you can do something a little different than how we used to spend our time. And to be in a birthseye seat for that is a true gift in an honor.
So Blinda, I'm completely ignorant of your company, and you're part of the hospitality business.
When I walk into a stadium.
I don't know get beer, I just get my peerer, and I just assume they're employees of the team or of the I don't know what's you guys have four hundred thousand employees at fifty sites all over the world. Just amazing. Can you tell us about kind of coming
out of the pandemic. What are you seeing in your business, because again, it seems like everybody just wants to get out and they've been getting out over the past couple of years and going to big events and maybe you know, ticking off bucket list items.
What have you seen in your business?
Yeah, look, you've said a few things there that I'll jump on.
I think first and foremost, if you're going to a game and you're getting your beer and your hot dog and back to your seat, then that's what's supposed to happen. Yeah, I think you shouldn't spend too much time thinking about the magic behind the scenes that makes it all happen.
But as you mentioned, we are fortunate. We have about twenty thousand associates just in the sports and leisure division across about one hundred and fifty venues just here in the US and Canada, and it takes a lot to make that magic happen, and in a way that as a fan, you get to focus on what you're.
There to experience, and that food.
And beverage just is an augmentation to a great service experience. But I think first and foremost, as you mentioned, the hospitality industry has changed greatly. Obviously through the pandemic we see we see a real shift in who is working in hospitality.
Obviously, with the unemployment rate.
Getting back to a lower level, the labor market is still tight and finding those folks who who have a love of being a part of live events is a different challenge than.
What we're facing before COVID. I think in.
Terms of what we're seeing from consumers. It's fascinating. Whether it's the pitch clock changes in MLB, whether it's the introduction of autonomous experiences where you can get your beer and your hot dog and sometimes not even speak to an individual. We are seeing the consumers still want to be back in those big live environments.
They want to actually spend more when they're there.
They want to get out of their seat more often because they trust that they can get back to their seat and not miss.
A moment of the game.
So certainly, I think we've seen all the trends of pre pandemic in terms of consumers wanting things faster, wanting to elevate their experience.
We're just seeing it all moving at a more rapid pace.
Well, And I'm curious about the labor components side of it, because you say it's still tight, although we're starting to see some signs of maybe a little bit softening. But I agree it's still a tight labor market. I increasingly on the retail.
Side, if I'm shopping.
More and more often, checking myself out, even taking off security tabs, what are you guys doing? Are you increasingly more pressure to automate things in your industry because you can't find those workers.
Look, it's funny.
I think there was a lot of fear, certainly a few years ago, that automizing the retail experience or the consumer experience was going.
To take hospitality jobs away.
But what's interesting is we are seeing we've got the same number of individuals employed. If it takes somewhere like the Mariners T Mobile Stadium in Seattle. We have four autonomous retail environments by Amazon just walk out, we have no we have the same number of.
Employees because what people has shifted.
I think while you're checking yourself out, the expectations of the level of service and hospitality in greeting, in going that little bit above and beyond to make sure you've had a great day, I think that that need has elevated. So we're seeing the type of labor need change. I think the days of you know, going through the checkout and not having any kind of interaction are well and truly over.
That's what autonomous is for.
But the spirit of service and hospitality that is still high demand and highly sought after in an employee base.
Hey, well, lin, it just seems I'm not sure if it's just in the US, but certainly in the US it seems to be an arms race for these stadiums. The bigger and more luxurious and have more services, and it's not just the beer and a hot dog anymore. You can get all kinds of stuff there.
How do you beating caviare exactly?
How do you how do you keep up? Who kind of drives that? Is that you guys driving it?
Or is that the owner of a franchise saying I need more, I need better.
M Well, I think every owner of every franchise is saying I need more, I need better, because we're all fighting for the same share of mind. I think now that that's a really healthy level of I think it's a healthy paranoia to make sure that you are always trying to elevate, stay on top. We're very fortunate we have talented teams of chefs and operators in our venues.
We also get the benefits, especially doing some of these really high end clubs and restaurants, which, of course as the as the experience is elevated from hot dogs and burgers to as you mentioned, champagne and caviat and all the rest of the local favorites.
We do work with a lot of restaurant tour partners.
So I think ultimately who drives that constant pushing of the envelope is the fan you look at, whether it's the food Network, today's consumer is just so they have such a higher expectation of what wows. So you have to be constantly going a little bit outside of the norm. Whether that is you know, again you're still going to get your traditional favorites, but whether it's sweet Tea fried Chicken in Indianapolis or Jambalaya in New Orleans, you know
you have to bring that local flavor in. But the one thing I would say is what we have to be careful about as we can continue to elevate and expand the experience is the heart of consumers coming to these events is not based on elevation. Is it is the experience we all remember growing up. So having those game day favorites, having them affordable for everyone to keep bringing their kids and their grandkids to these experiences, you know, it just means we have more tears. I would say,
of what you can experience. If you want a high end experience, you got it. If you want to come for a beer and a hot dog, it won't break the bank. You got that, Hey, thirty seconds.
So you've got to feel inflationary pressures, whether it's on wages or food costs. I mean you are construction costs?
How much?
How difficult is that? And again just about thirty seconds. Yeah absolutely, I mean you've hit it.
Concrete is still through the roof, but truckings have obviously been mitigated.
You know, inflation. We are certainly in deflation.
So I think in terms of what have we done, we have learned to be much better at working in.
This environment menu engineering.
We have a twenty billion dollar purchasing network as an organization, so we get to take advantage of that scale.
But I think this inflationary environment, it's going to keep switching where the pressure is. But our job and so Live's job is to be better than the best at that. And thanks to us yall, we're able.
To looking forward to experiencing some events, certainly in the New York. Blinda Oerkley, CEO is SADEXO Live. Thank you so much, really appreciate it.
You're listening to the tape cats Are Live program Bloomberg Markets weekdays at ten am Eastern on Bloomberg Radio. The tune in app, Bloomberg dot Com and the Bloomberg Business app. You can also listen live on Amazon Alexa from our flagship New York station Just say Alexa playing Bloomberg eleven thirty.
Yeah, we get into the you said, another huge sports weekend here.
We've got college football, NFL, professional basketball, means a little bit.
Everything's coming together.
And one of the biggest areas of sports in this country over the last several years has been sportsmbling, and the amount of money that is now being wagered is just extraordinary. Seems like all of the leagues, after decades and decades of trying to keep sports betting out of their business, are now opening arms and welcoming them in. One of the players there is Charles Gillespie. He's the
CEO of Gambling dot Com. Unfortunately he's also graduated in the University of North Carolina, so that's a check mark against him. To crowd exactly, Hey, Charles, talk to us about just how your business has evolved over the last three or four years. It's just almost night and day.
It really is.
You know, as many of the listeners will know, the Supreme Court decision in twenty eighteen really upended the world of sports betting in the United States. We've been running this business for going on twenty years, but mainly in Europe, in the UK, Ireland and a number of other European markets, and we had to turn the whole ship around and pointed at the United States. In twenty eighteen nineteen, we had just a couple of million dollars in revenue in
North America. And this year we'll have our guidances to exceed one hundred million in revenue for the whole group, and we expect an absolute majority of that to come from North America. So, you know, it's completely transformed our business, and the US is now the center at gravity for the global online gambling industry.
You know, we talked earlier about people want to experience thing, but people do also want to gamble increasingly. Hey, tell us about your business, because from what I understand, I just want to understand exactly what the business model is. I mean, you guys are provider digital marketing services for the online gambling industry. What exactly does that mean laid out for us all?
So we do the same thing for online sports betting and online casinos that essentially like a hotels dot Com does for an online hotel. You know, if you're going to travel to Paris, you're not going to go to ten different Parisian hotel websites to find a tell You're going to go to a website that has all that information in one place. So, for example, if you want to bet on sports in New York, there's a variety
of different options. They have different strengths, they have different bonus offers, they have different levels of customer support, et cetera, et cetera. So you come to a website like gambling
dot Com, but we we run over fifty websites. We've also got Bookies dot Com, casinos dot Com, and a number of others, and there we will show you all the information that would be relevant to you as a sports vetter or online casino customer and help you make the best decision for you in terms of where to play.
So then people would leave one of our websites, they'll go to the online gambling operator's website and there are our clients, and they pay us on a performance basis for the number of new depositing customers that we can send to them from our portfolio of websites.
You know, I never thought I'd see this, Charles, but Mickey Mouse is now in the sports betting business. Espn bet just launched here. What does that mean for the industry and what does it mean for you guys.
Up until they launched, you know, I think it was a lot of wait and see and speculation about whether or not this was going to be as big of a deal as everyone's making it out to be.
And since they have launched and.
They are a client of ours, we are helping them acquire customers. The initial numbers have been spectacular, unlike anything we've ever seen before. So what's clear to us at this point is that espn bet will will no doubt be able to acquire customers. And the next question is will they be able to retain those customers. Will they stick around, will they like the products? Will they get the right sort of CRM engagement to make sure that they're not just there to kick the tires once, but
that they actually become long term customers. And if they do that, they will be a major force to be reckoned with in the United States.
I'm thinking if I was a gambling AI chatbot, I would want to be linked in to you because you probably have a lot of data and information on gambling trends. Give me an idea first of all, of like, what is it that people really really want to bet on? Where's the most activity seemingly happening or at least the inquiries based on what you guys are seeing. Give me an idea, and I'm curious too, take it to the next level generative AI.
How it plays into your business.
Yeah, well, people bet on the biggest sports in America. Obviously, you know, it's NFL and it's NBA. For an NFL event, you'll get more, you know, betting on the match than you would on anything else. But you know, there's a lot more NBA games and there's a lot more MLB games than there are NFL games, So in aggregate that can that can total to more than than NFL. But you know, for on a kind of per match event, you'll see the most handle on that. Generative AI for
us has been fantastic. You know, we've used it internally to streamline a lot of our internal process in terms of producing content. You know, we employ hundreds of people, uh internally and and and you know hundreds more externally to make sure that we have the best content on the Internet when it comes to anything related to gambling.
You know, we produce an enormous amount of original content, but uh, you know, the the generative AI can be helpful at the margins to to you know, buff and polish and check things in addition to what we do with our editors. But on the development side, in terms of just making software, it's also been hugely helpful. You know, a developer with these co pilot tools now is in
order of magnitude, more productive than they were previously. And and you know that has all sorts of implications and it'll allows us to be more ambitious in terms of the features and development plans that we can take on.
Hey, Charles, thank you very much for joining us. Really appreciate it.
Charles Gillespie, CEO of gambling dot com. That is a Nastak traded company, Gambas and boy is there and you can check that out. And I'm just shocked at how quickly this sports betting has just exploded. Maybe you shouldn't have been, because it's always been an active, you know, underground kind of.
Business with absolutely huge numbers.
But you're seeing all these leagues that publicly publicly said, oh, will never associate ourselves with this sort kind.
Of find it talking a little bit.
I don't knows a little bit. Yeah, kind of interesting to just see it. I should put out that that stock, by the way, saying about twenty percent. When it reported earnings in November sixteenth, they put out their full year guidance. They affirmed it, but I think analysts think it might be on the low end, so maybe people looking for more.
You're listening to the tape catch a live program Bloomberg Markets weekdays at ten am on Bloomberg Radio, the tune in app, Bloomberg dot Com, and the Bloomberg Business app. You can also listen live on Amazon Alexa from our flagship New York station, Just say Alexa play Bloomberg eleven thirty.
We're going to stick with the retail sector.
I'm looking at our blog, our live blog that's on the Bloomberg terminal.
In person.
Black Friday shopping appears relatively muted this year. Online shopping up, with many sales starting days or weeks ago, Consumers looking for deals as they grapple with elevated inflation. So that's kind of our backdrop as we head to Tom mcgeeh CEO on president at ICSC. It's the industry group that, as its website reminds, US, represents marketplaces and spaces where people shop, dyne, workplay, and gather.
So they do it all.
So think shopping centers and malls and mixed use centers and street level storefronts. Tom is on Zoom from Los Angeles. Hey, Tom, Great to be talking with you again. I'm here with Paul Sweeney.
What are you hearing?
Yeah?
What are you happy?
Thanksgiving? Happy holidays? What are you hearing as you do channel checks about what's going on in these mixed use spaces and at malls and shopping centers.
I expect this to be a strong Thanksgiving weekend.
The you know, our expectations will be one hundred and thirty billion dollars spent this weekend.
That's about four percent more than last year.
You know, consumers continue to be concerned around inflation.
I was listening to your conversation with Charlie.
I think he's very reflective of consumer mindset one in focusing upon food and beverage and experiences. I mean that that will be up over the holiday season almost eight percent, seven point six percent. But looking at discounts this There's going to be a lot of promotions this weekend, and I think that will drive a lot of traffic, both in person and online. People with the concern, you know, with the concern, with the concern around pricing and inflation,
you know, retailers are going to lean in. This will be a heavy promotion year. As a consumers are price sensitive.
Hey exactly, Hey, Tom, I know you guys se do a big survey here about what people are going to be doing over this Thanksgiving weekend and the holidays. Are people going to be going to stores? I mean people still do that or is it just point and click now?
People, of course people go to stores.
If people want to go to stores, the communities would not flourish around the country. So we represent everything, as Carol's introduction suggested, street retail in every neighborhood across the United States to large regional malls.
And so people will go on shopping.
Ninety percent of consumers will hit a store over this holiday season. I think discount department stores will clearly be the biggest winners over the holiday because of the concern around pricing. We've seen that trend over the course of the year, and gift cards will be you know, highly highly sought after. You know, the big tread and retail, as we've talked about the past, is the integration between
the physical and digital world. So you will retailers are somewhat agnostic as to where you buy the product, you where you initiate the transaction. They would, however, prefer you go to the store to pick it up. That's the most profit effective way for them to serve their consumer, and consumers are you know, focused upon efficiency and so you're really seeing those retailers that are particularly in proximity
to where people live, do quite well. And you know, occupancy is super high right now as retailers are using their stores for both traditional shopping but also as a little mini fulfillment centers.
Tom, I know we talked earlier this year. I'm just curious and just remind our audience. I mean, are we're back. I'm trying to figure out because we talked about demise of them.
All for so long. So where are we are?
What's the what's the uh you know data point that you kind of compare where today is to where it was. That's important and gives us kind of some smart perspective.
Look, I think the narrative around the demise of the mall has been in existence for forty years. I mean, the people have talked about the mall dying, and here we are today, and principally there's about the same number of malls in the United States as there was a decade ago.
There are clearly some thriving malls. There's clearly some malls that are struggling.
But you know, and that is such an iconic part of people's perspective of retail, but it's a relatively small percentage of the total retail square footage in the United States. That said, occupanceeing malls across the entire sector is in the mid eighty percent. Class A malls, high end malls.
Are doing much much better than that.
And then open air retail, you know, everything from grocery anchored retail in suburban America to Target and Costco and Walmart anchored retail, that's in the mid to high ninety percent.
And so physical retail.
There has been no really new supply put on the MA market since the Great Financial Crisis, and yet retail sales have almost.
Doubled over that period of time.
And so you know, there's there's really a lack of supply in the market for the demand for physical space that retailers want, but clearly open air retail in proximity to where people live is particularly strong right.
Now, Tom, are there any hot categories of purchases this season or maybe products that are kind of getting the attention of retailers.
Well, obviously it's the holiday season.
So I think that you know, toys and electronics will always be will always be, you know.
In vogue. But I think the category.
That's going to do particularly well this the part of retail that's going to go do particularly well is discount. You know, discount retail is going to do well because consumers are very price conscious and people do you know, it's hard, as you're, as Charlie suggested, to know exactly what to buy, even when it's somebody you've known for
three decades. And so I think gift cards are often, you know, very very are quite frankly the most popular gift category because people want to give the recipient the flexibility to buy what they want.
Well, apparently, if you've got young kids in your life, the Squish mellow Squish mallow, a plush stuff animal our Live retail Sales blog. Apparently at a Virginia Walmart Charlotteessvale, three customers asked about the five dollars squishmllow, Am I saying it right? In a matter of minutes. Apparently they've sold out and it's just kind of this squishy little pillow.
I don't know.
That seems to be what is interesting. I do wonder about the toy retailers. Right, there's so much you can buy online here. What are you hearing about that sector specifically?
Well, I think you're right.
I think that, you know, I think the toy the toy sector has been you know, it's been disrupted for the last twenty years or so, right in multiple dimensions, one online, but also back to discount retailers, discount department stories. I mean, obviously they've grown out there their toy space, amount of space devoted to toys, and so a toy specific retailer is going to be challenged because they're getting
a competition in multiple fronts. That said, you know, specialty retail if it's unique and it provides an experience, you know, could do quite well.
But kind of the mass merchant toy retailer is really not.
You know, it's not the same as it was twenty years ago or even forty years ago when we.
Were growing I remember going to the Seers and it was like the Barbie isle and it was like who you walk down, it was pretty cool stuff. It's a very different environment today, Paul.
Yeah, Hey, Tom, if I actually find myself in a store and it's a very low probability that that's going to happen. Am I going to find stuff on the shelves? Hell's the inventory, supply chain all that stuff?
Yeah, of course, of course. You well, I think you know one thing, it's just implicit in your question.
I don't know exactly where you live, Paul, but I think that it's important to recognize that New York City and Manhattan is its own ecosystem, and there is clearly a lot of people that's chopped online in Manhattan for a variety of reasons.
Yeah, but when you get off the island and you go to the rest of America.
People do go to stores, and that is still by far the most popular way to shop in suburban America. And of course, remember what's happened in the course of the pandemic is people have moved back to the suburbs. Suburban retail, suburban real estate is back in vogue, and so people will go out and masses to the stores this weekend. And the supply chain issues that we're experienced at the height of the pandemic have really retailers have kind of managed their way through that.
So I don't think that's going to be an issue.
Good, right, Yeah, interesting, right, Yeah, absolutely, it's true that migration right post pandemic of people back out to the burbs, that's a good thing for a lot of retail, traditional retail. Hey Tom McGee, thank you so much, CEO and president of ICSSE joining us on Zoom from Los Angeles. Happy, Happy post Thanksgiving, and I'm sure we're going to be checking in with him throughout the holiday season.
Yeah.
Absolutely, So I can tell you that Short Hills Mall will be today and they will be lined up on Route twenty four waiting to get in.
For the line is like outside to exit.
Yeah, it's just extraordinary and it's a great great mom people still love going to that.
Thanks for listening to the Bloomberg Markets podcasts. You can subscribe and listen to interviews at Apple Podcasts or whatever. Podcast platform you prefer. I'm Matt Miller. I'm on Twitter at Matt Miller nineteen seventy three.
And I'm fall Sweeney.
I'm on Twitter at pt Sweeney.
Before the podcast, you can always catch us worldwide at Bloomberg Radio