few years.  Speaking at the World Retail Congress in London, the two retail veterans emphasized the significance of Authentic Luxury Group’s partnership with Amazon, delving deeper into consumer data and expanding into hospitality and entertainment segments to drive consumer engagement and store traffic.  Creating a multi-billion dollar luxury ecosystem Since ABG was first launched in 2010, Salter explained that a key focus on the multi-brand management company has been centered around distribution. “You need distribution to sell your brands”, Salter noted, which is where the brand management company’s deal with Saks Global comes into play.  Baker stated: “We’re building what we [ABG and Saks Global] believe will be the world’s greatest luxury ecosystem.” The Saks Global executive chairman pointed out that Authentic Luxury Group has an estimated gross merchandising value well over $9 billion, which represents about 60 per cent of luxury distribution in the US.  In collaboration with two other partners, Salesforce and Amazon, Baker believes there is mass potential for Authentic Luxury Group’s growth in the US, but also in markets like India, Japan, Great Britain and the Middle East.  Expanding upon Authentic Luxury Group’s potential with Amazon’s partnership, Baker pointed to the recent launch of Saks on Amazon, an endeavor that has been six years in the making.  Baker explained that the idea was to create a space for customers to shop luxury goods from Saks on Amazon, free of fake goods or some of Amazon’s lower-priced items, at a faster and more convenient rate.  Saks on Amazon is “going to be the most natural thing you ever imagined, because they  [Amazon] have the most elegant execution and the most reach of anyone in the world online,” said Baker. “The luxury consumer wants the best of everything, and that means how they interact online.” Delving into data Baker expressed that another key point in Authentic Luxury Group’s plans to become a luxury retail giant is right-sizing the company’s vendor matrix.  He recalled: “When we put all these companies [under ABG and Saks Global’s portfolios] together, it turned out we had 2660 vendors, which is way too many, and the terms of many of these vendors weren’t right.” Baker added: “We had to reset our expectations for what vendor relationships would look like, and as a part of that [shift], we’re changing our promotional calendar.” The Saks Global chairman explained that in an industry like the US, where there are “too many” luxury department stores, there often is a negative domino effect. Once one luxury retailer starts promoting sales even two weeks earlier, then everyone has to follow suit, trickling down to vertical brands having to follow the lead of the department stores. “Now, with our new structure, we’re able to delay promotion, which is going to give our brand partners a chance to have more full-price selling in their own stores. And if you do this right, there will be less [excess] inventory, less vendors, more margin and less promotion, it’s going to make the entire industry in the United States healthier,” said Baker.  As Salter pointed out, a critical strategy in right-sizing the company’s vendor matrix is delving into data more dexterously. The ABG executive noted that between the brand management group and Saks Global, there are over 250 million data files.  The data collected from Saks Global and Authentic Brands Group’s joint portfolio of brands will tell Authentic Luxury Group all about who their customers are, from their ages to their shopping preferences and which brands are working versus those that aren’t, which is critical.  Add in Amazon’s wealth of information and its data reading capabilities, Salter noted that the three-way combination between the e-retail giant, Saks Global and Authentic Brands Group “has just made us so much smarter.” “We can figure out stuff literally in minutes, if not seconds. What used to take us an enormous amount of time in research, where now you just push a button to find out certain information about those maps,” he emphasized.  Leaning into hospitality and entertainment opportunities Aside from adding on to the luxury group’s e-commerce and data-reading capabilities, another key component in Authentic Luxury Group’s $9 billion mission is leaning into the entertainment and hospitality sector. “A lot of people think we’re just in the clothing business. We’re not just in the clothing business, we’re in the hospitality business,” Salter explained.  This includes residential condo development. “Why is that so important to be in the hospitality business?” Salter proposed. “Because at the end of the day, what happens? They [customers] go into Saks [or any other luxury department store with residential properties] and they buy all their home products there.”  He added: “A lot of luxury brands today are getting into the hospitality business in a big way, with condos and hotels… And we really didn’t have any brands that could go into that at that high level, other than Barney’s. So having Saks, Bergdorf Goodman and even Neiman go into the hospitality space is critical.” Salter disclosed that there are currently six to seven projects already in progress to dip into the hospitality space, with plans to expand into this sector in the Middle East and Asia Pacific markets.  On the entertainment front, Salter pointed to the importance of content creation, revealing that content makes up for approximately 25 per cent of ABG’s business today.  An example of content that is in the works is ABG’s Amazon-exclusive series focused on the history of several key Barney’s female executives.  Salter also added that department-store-centered events and experiences will be a strong part of the plan to drive more traffic into stores.  “Everyone knows that the entertainment and the experience side of the business is rooting. So by bringing that experience into our stores, we’re bringing our consumers indoors since we can’t really rely on the shopping centers anymore.” “To get the consumers, we have to rely on ourselves to bring them in,” Salter concluded.