What is one headline that you predict will happen in 2025?
Speaker ALet's go to you, Dave Ritter, close us out.
Speaker AWhat's the headline?
Speaker BAll right.
Speaker BAmazon launches another new grocery format.
Speaker BAmazon can't quit grocery and they can't get grocery.
Speaker BRight.
Speaker BIt is just, it happens every year.
Speaker BAnd I think it's a good bet that in the headlines next year they'll have some slightly different variants of what they've tried and failed several times before.
Speaker CYeah.
Speaker BBecause they have such logistical prowess that they just seem to not be able to nail grocery.
Speaker BAnd I have all the faith in the world that they will continue to try.
Speaker AMaybe we can buy Pepsi at that grocery store.
Speaker AWho knows?
Speaker ADave, anything is possible.
Speaker AChad, let's go to you.
Speaker AWhat retail headline do you think we're going to see in 2025?
Speaker CIt also would have been a good one, Dave, for most laughable 2024 headline.
Speaker CAnother format.
Speaker COkay.
Speaker CEarly 2025 headline, see 2024.
Speaker CInteresting.
Speaker CSo in my last minute research on this, I went back to what you guys predicted for 2024.
Speaker COh in last year's show, right.
Speaker CAnd David Brown said, you know, he called it the bloodbath to boom projection.
Speaker CThat while in 2023 we're going to push retailers toward a breaking point, right.
Speaker CHe thought in 2024 consumers are going to start spending again and that, you know, kind of the retail, especially luxury area rebounded really well I will say Dave Ritter called it much better that there was going to be belt tightening, more saving versus spending, trading down.
Speaker CAnd 24 is a little too early to call for the recovery.
Speaker CSo David Brown's going back to the well again.
Speaker CHe's saying, listen, easing monetary policies, you know, lower interest rates, high stock market, high end Chinese consumers coming back, that's been missing for a few years.
Speaker CHe's calling for the boom.
Speaker CI actually think this might be a little bit of a la la land moment, you know, where maybe the Omni's been been been given differently.
Speaker CHere's what I'll say and I'm gonna kind of flashback moment.
Speaker CI'm gonna go back to what you said last year, Chris, where you expected some shakeup in Target's leadership in 24.
Speaker COkay, didn't happen.
Speaker CBut let's look at what happened this year.
Speaker CThe difference between Walmart and Target could not be more palpable this year.
Speaker CRight.
Speaker CTarget stock has recovered a little bit from its 52 week low in November, but it's still down 6 or so percent on the year.
Speaker CAmazon's up 50.
Speaker CWalmart's up 88 0.
Speaker CRight.
Speaker CMcMillan's the CEO of the year.
Speaker CIt's like giving it to Michael Jordan every year.
Speaker CYou're looking for other folks, but counter that with what's happening at Target and Brian Cornell, you figure something has to be up in 2025.
Speaker AYeah, he'll be on stage at NRF early in 2025, so I'll be curious to hear what he has to say.
Speaker ATheir plans are, too, Chris.
Speaker CYeah, yeah.
Speaker DIf he makes it through the fiscal year, too.
Speaker DSo the year's not over yet either.
Speaker DThat's the other thing here that we got to factor in.
Speaker DBut, yeah, I think it.
Speaker DI think that prediction could come true to some degree.
Speaker DMine.
Speaker DMine goes back to.
Speaker DI kind of alluded to it before.
Speaker DI think this might be the actual year that we see activists win their battle to take Macy's private.
Speaker DI don't know that Macy's can hold on very much longer, particularly since they're already now in another activist battle just after getting out of the last one, so.
Speaker DAnd, you know, strategically, it just seems like a really hard ship to turn around, so.
Speaker DAnd the real estate does seem very valuable within that activist play relative to other activist plays we've seen in the past.
Speaker DSo I think this might be the year that comes to fruition.
Speaker DThat's mine.
Speaker AOkay, well, I'll close it out with mine, which is that I think we're going to start to see some regional, especially grocers, start to converge their retail media networks.
Speaker AI think that we're going to start to see fewer or less value in every single grocer having their own retail media network.
Speaker AI think it's going to be too much for the brand.
Speaker ASo I think we're going to start to see more of them coming together to pool pull their retail media networks into one, to really be more appealing to brands and to compete with the likes of, you know, the bigger ones out there, the Albertsons, the Krogers and the Walmarts and others.
Speaker BSo.