Executives from Ulta Beauty, Stitch Fix, Tapestry, and other retailers discussed the evolution of omnichannel retail at the CommerceNext Growth Show on June 24, 2026. Kimberly Shenk, CEO of marketing technology firm Novi, noted that consumers are increasingly shifting product discovery to AI agents and large language models like ChatGPT and Gemini, requiring brands to maintain consistent identity across every touchpoint (Retail Dive - Technology).
Josh Friedman, senior vice president of e-commerce and digital at Ulta Beauty, highlighted that omnichannel now extends beyond in-store and online to include app usage in physical locations. Ulta has 47 million loyalty program members, with 95% of sales flowing through the loyalty program (Retail Dive - Technology). Tapestry trained its agentic AI bots on conversations between store associates and customers to replicate the in-store concierge experience online, while Stitch Fix emphasized that technology should serve relationship-building rather than replace human advisers (Retail Dive - Technology).
For commerce practitioners, the key takeaway is that AI success depends on understanding customer needs first, not deploying technology for its own sake. Panelists stressed that loyalty programs remain critical connective tissue across channels, and that brand consistency and emotional connection are as important as algorithmic optimization in the age of agentic AI.