Iconic no more: Why former CMO Alexander Meyer left The Iconic for Canada’s oldest retailer; creativity now trumps ‘table stakes’ digital marketing for competitive advantage

Few have been as deeply involved as a marketing practitioner through the digital marketing boom of the past 20 years as Alexander Meyer, the former CMO at pureplay retailer The Iconic. But the targeting tools digital marketers have been using are fast hitting walls  – think cookies and the mass harvesting of user intent signals. Data and tech are just standard tools today - the biggest business differentiator, says Meyer, is a swing back to creativity. Meyer, born in Communist East Germany before the Berlin Wall fell in 1989, has moved to Canada to take up a role at The Bay, the new digital-first retail play by The Hudson’s Bay Company. Digital “pureplays won the battle”, Meyer says, but “omni retailers will win the war”. This is the most exciting retail tech platform in the world right now, he reckons. He also says marketing can 'save the world' - but it needs radically new DNA.

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