This episode with Brett Duarte reframes AI in logistics around a $10 trillion industry, exploring how tactical use cases like route optimization and control towers pair with strategic network design and governance to drive real ROI. It covers trusted data sources, platform choices, and the rise of citizen developers, while framing su...

The New Thing Gap - What retail took away when it took away the friction, with NYT editor Eric Athas. In 1995, buying a pair of sneakers cost you 30 minutes and five miles of driving. Today it takes about four seconds. New York Times editor Eric Athas spent four years reporting on what that trade did to people, and he has a name for ...

In this episode, Brett Duarte breaks down how AI driven demand forecasting and inventory optimization work together to reduce stockouts and improve turns, with Amazon’s 35% drop in stockouts serving as a benchmark. He walks through the forecasting toolkit—extrapolation, regression, machine learning, and large language models for narr...

In this first installment of Data Blades' AI supply chain mini-series, Brett Duarte of ASU breaks down why AI pilots frequently stall at enterprise scale, focusing on procurement, supplier risk, and contract intelligence. He identifies two universal blockers— fragmented infrastructure and adoption challenges—then explains agentic AI ...

This episode tells the rise, fall, and revival of in-store retail media through the lens of Mike Hiatt, who built Walmart’s Smart Network from a 27-inch ceiling display into a high-revenue in-store powerhouse that once out-earned Walmart.com. It dives into the internal frictions between marketing and merchandising, why the network wa...

Steve Worthy on The Accelerator Mindset - founder fit, product market fit, and the question retail buyers are really asking. Steve Worthy is back on Blade to Greatness to break down what he calls the accelerator mindset - how growth happens inside a retail business, and why the gap is almost never the product. Start with founder fit ...