Speakers

Our Consumer Week speaker line-up includes top retail leaders, analysts and industry experts. Watch this space for more names to be announced.

Natalie Berg, Retail Analyst and Founder, NBK Retail

For nearly two decades, Natalie has delivered fresh insights on the trends shaping the global retail sector, with a particular focus on the convergence of physical and digital commerce. She is passionate about how retailers can enhance the customer experience and has co-authored two books on retail, including Amazon: How the World’s Most Relentless Retailer Will Continue to Revolutionize Commerce.

Natalie is a regular keynote speaker on the retail conference circuit and, as an objective TV and radio commentator, her views on retail have been published in the FT, BBC, The Guardian and The Times, among others. Natalie also writes a guest column for Forbes and Retail Week.

Rasmus Brix, Managing Director, Pandora

Rasmus Brix is the General Manager for the British Isles cluster and has been with Pandora for four years. He began his Pandora career in October 2016 as Vice-President of Business Development and in 2018 was promoted to Chief Transformation Officer and member of the executive leadership team. In that role, Rasmus successfully led the transformation and turnaround ‘Programme Now’.

Before joining Pandora, Rasmus worked for five years as a Management Consultant in Qvartz, most recently as an Engagement Partner. He is commercially focused and has a strategic mind with extensive knowledge of retail.

Lisa Byfield-Green, Research Director, Retail Week

Lisa is responsible for data insight, analyst content and advisory research at Retail Week. Previously, she worked as a Senior Retail Analyst for online and digital, leading research at IGD and Planet Retail (now Edge by Ascential) in the UK and more recently LZ Retailytics in Germany.

Lisa regularly provides commentary on the retail industry and presents at briefings, conferences and workshops.

Isobel Chillman, Relationship Director, Retail Week

As Relationship Director, Isobel builds connections with global retailers and non-retail partners alike.

An avid podcaster and presenter – on stage, TV and radio – Isobel has interviewed some of the UK’s leading retail CEOs.

Megan Dunsby, Senior Commercial Content Editor, Retail Week

Megan is Retail Week’s Senior Commercial Content Editor. A former journalist and Features Editor, she joined Retail Week in January 2019 to help brands leverage content to reach the people that matter in retail. Megan also works on Be Inspired, Retail Week’s events and content programme that promotes inclusivity across the sector.

In 2018 she was named among The Drum’s 50 Under 30 Top Women in Digital and in 2016 she was recognised with the Silver Rising Star accolade at the British Media Awards.

Constanze Freienstein, Managing Director, Lands’ End Europe

Constanze oversees Lands’ End’s European operations and business, including developing and executing strategies designed to deliver value growth and expand its customer base. She brings more than 20 years of experience in leading and advising successful multichannel retail and lifestyle businesses across Europe.

Constanze has held key leadership and board positions at various European and US companies including Hudson’s Bay, McArthurGlen Group, Metro, Kearney and Procter & Gamble. With decades of success in the retail and ecommerce space and extensive knowledge of the European market, Constanze leverages her skills and experience to grow Lands’ End’s presence in this market and lead digital transformation for the business. 

Kris Hamer, Director of Insight, British Retail Consortium (BRC)

Kris Hamer leads the BRC Insight team and the delivery of all insight publications and events. He has spent his career working for UK retailers including Tesco, Waitrose, Asda and SSP Group, both in store and in central operations, leading teams that delivered analytical insights and operational change.

Kris has a PhD in applied statistical modelling of retail performance data and is a fellow of Henley Business School.

Richard Hammond, Chief Executive and Co-founder, Uncrowd

Richard Hammond is proud to have been in retail for more than 35 years and is an accomplished speaker, consultant and bestselling author of Smart Retail, as well as his recent breakthrough work Friction/Reward. Richard is Chief Executive and Co-Founder at Uncrowd, winner of the Microsoft Start-up Partner of the Year Award 2020 and the world expert in measuring relative attractiveness, a ground-breaking new customer analytics approach for retailers and brands.

Rob Harris, Vice-President of Commercial, Deliveroo

Nicola Harrison, Director of Commercial Content, Retail Week

As Head of Commercial Content, Nicola leads Retail Week’s growing content marketing business Connect. Her team produces intelligent and timely thought-leadership content for a range of big clients such as Google, Facebook and Microsoft through products including comprehensive reports and live and virtual events. Nicola’s job is to ensure quality content across all of Connect’s output and to lead on product development while ensuring Connect hits its quarterly revenue targets. She chairs panels, speaks at events and delivers client presentations.

Nicola has 14 years of experience as a business journalist. She has held positions including News Editor and Content Editor at Retail Week, during which time she led the editorial team to a digital-first approach. Nicola joined the Connect team in 2017.

Hector Hickmott, Head of Retail, HSO

Hector Hickmott has been working on enterprise systems for 20 years, helping businesses make the most of opportunities to support profitable growth and improve operations. Starting his career as a provider of SAP systems to the retail sector during the dot-com boom, he has worked with many innovative brands and businesses.

In 2007, Hector set up Junction Solutions UK.  Providing truly omnichannel systems, Junction Solutions pioneered the use of Microsoft Dynamics in retail before being acquired by HSO in 2012. Hector took on the role of Head of Retail at HSO, supporting the company’s ambitions to accelerate its global footprint. Driving retail sales, HSO is now the most successful provider of Microsoft-based business systems, with more than 400 clients across the world.

Georgia Kinahan, Senior Content Manager, Retail Week

Georgia Kinahan is Retail Week Connect’s Senior Content Manager. She was previously at the Financial Times where she worked at FT Live, programming a range of large-scale events within the retail and luxury industries.

Emily Kraftman, Managing Director – UK and Europe, Who Gives a Crap

Emily joined Who Gives a Crap in January as Managing Director for UK and Europe, responsible for spearheading the international expansion of the eco-friendly toilet paper business. Previously, she led marketing for the UK and eventually all global markets at Deliveroo, scaling a commercially oriented and strategic team. She led these teams through a massive period of the company’s growth to become one of Europe’s biggest unicorn success stories, from early 2016 until its recent IPO in 2021.

Emily began her career in organisations renowned for their strengths in brand-building for consumers, including Nestlé and ABInBev. She is an avid adventure traveller, often seeking out new countries to explore and most recently learning to surf, but as a born-and-bred Londoner and lifelong Chelsea FC fan, London will always be home.

Ross Monaghan, Sales Director, Pandora

Ross Monaghan is Sales Director for Pandora, responsible for over 200 Pandora retail stores across the UK and Ireland, which is the company’s second biggest market after the USA.

Ross has been with Pandora since 2019, having previously worked in sales leadership roles with high street brands including Monsoon, Kurt Geiger and Warehouse. 

He is on the UK and Ireland management team at Pandora and is also a sponsor of the company’s regional Pride network.

AJ Patel, Global Head of Ecommerce, REN Clean Skincare

Currently the Global Head of Ecommerce at REN Clean Skincare, AJ Patel has spent more than seven years in leadership roles within Unilever Prestige, including a role as Director of Analytics at Murad.

With more than a decade of experience and expertise in digital marketing and ecommerce, Patel’s grasp of the ever-changing digital landscape and passion for sustainable practices led him to his current position at REN.  In 2021, renskincare.com was the fastest-growing DTC brand in Unilever’s US prestige portfolio.

Neesha Sharma, Editorial Manager, Trinny London

Neesha Sharma is Editorial Manager at Trinny London, a digital-first beauty brand on a mission to give every individual the confidence to be their best. Working in Marketing at Trinny London for more than three years, Neesha has supported the digital expansion of the brand as it has scaled from a start-up to quickly becoming one of Europe's fastest-growing beauty brands. 

Before joining Trinny London, Neesha managed the online content at global children's attraction, KidZania London, driving an impactful cross-channel social strategy, owning community management and asset creation across all touchpoints working in partnership with industry-leading brands like British Airways, WWE, H&M and Pokémon.

Rosie Shepard, Reporter, Retail Week

As Reporter for Retail Week, Rosie covers fashion, home and DIY, electricals, general merchandise, sustainability and ethics.

She also has experience in writing commercial content and organising events for the Retail Week audience.

Jasper Sutcliffe, UK Publishing and Affiliate Manager, Bookshop.org

Jasper Sutcliffe is the Publishing and Affiliate Manager at Bookshop.org in the UK. He joined Bookshop in August 2020 to help in its mission to financially support local, independent bookshops, publishers, publications, authors and other book-lovers.

Jasper was previously Head of Buying at Foyles, where he worked for 21 years, starting on the shop floor in the fiction department before progressing through the business to the position of Head of Buying.

Elissa Quinby, Senior Director of Retail Marketing, Quantum Metric

Elissa Quinby is Senior Director of Retail Marketing at Quantum Metric. As a retail evangelist, Elissa provides ecommerce expertise to the Quantum Metric community and provides real-world feedback to implement a customer centric culture using data driven decisions across the shopping journey. Prior to joining Quantum Metric, Elissa spent seven years with Amazon Retail holding roles across multiple industries including home, pets and automotive as well as various functions including Product Management, Programme Lead and Event and Category Marketing. Elissa has also held marketing roles at Baxter Healthcare Corporation, Google and American Eagle Outfitters.

Giovanna Vieira, Marketing Manager, Rotaro

Giovanna is a fashion Marketing Manager and all-round creative with almost 10 years of experience in the industry in buying, luxury brand management, retail operations and marketing.

She is an entrepreneurial manager with a proven track record of planning and executing campaigns and driving profitability for global companies, as well as small-to-medium enterprises. She has previously worked for companies including Ganni, Louis Vuitton, Selfridges and River Island.

Tom Ward, Chief Ecommerce Officer, Walmart

Tom Ward serves as Executive Vice-President and Chief Ecommerce Officer for Walmart US. In this role, he leads the company’s work to grow its online business by delivering exceptional customer and seller experiences across all online platforms and services. He is responsible for Walmart’s third-party Marketplace as it expands to include trusted sellers from around the world. As part of the Marketplace expansion, he drives efforts to expand key seller services like Walmart Fulfilment Services, access to capital and lower shipping rates.

Tom started his career at Asda and has held several roles across the international and US businesses, all with increasingly important scope and responsibility. In 2020, he was the recipient of the Sam M Walton Entrepreneur of the Year award, Walmart’s highest honour.

Peter Williams, Chair of Mister Spex, former Chair of Boohoo, Superdry and Domino’s

Peter is Chair at Mister Spex, the multichannel retailer selling eyewear online and in stores from its base in Berlin, and DP Eurasia, owner of the master franchise for Domino’s Pizza in Turkey and Russia. He is also Deputy Chair of Miinto, an online fashion retailer based in Copenhagen.

In his non-executive career, Peter has played a major role in the growth of three international retailers with a significant online presence: Asos, Boohoo and Mister Spex. During his executive career, he was on the board of Selfridges for 13 years, initially as Chief Financial Officer and then as Chief Executive. He was subsequently Chief Executive at Alpha Airports Group. 

Peter has also served on the boards of U+I Group, Superdry, Rightmove, Cineworld Group, Sophia Webster, Sportech, Jaeger, Blacks Leisure Group, JJB Sports, EMI Group, Silverstone, OfficeTeam, Erno Laszlo, Capital Radio and GCap Media.

Jay Wright, Chief Executive, Virgin Wines

Jay Wright is Chief Executive of Virgin Wines, having held the role since 2008 when he successfully merged the Warehouse Wines and Virgin Wines businesses. In 2013, he led a private equity-backed management buyout of the Virgin Wines business and, following substantial growth, took the business public in March 2021.

Prior to joining Virgin Wines, Jay held Managing Director roles at Warehouse Wines, the business he founded in 2000, and World Wines Direct, a subsidiary of the Greenalls Group.