#361 - From Ecuador to Your Table in 24 Hours: How UrbanStems Built a Time-Critical Supply Chain

Speaker A: Foreign. This is D2C pod, where the worlds of creators, consumer goods and brands collide. We get behind the wheel to show you how today's biggest products and ideas are made, launched and scaled. If it's shaping the future of commerce and culture, you'll Hear it here first. Catch new episodes weekly on Spotify, Apple Podcasts or D2C pod dot com. Be sure to check out our newsletter for weekly breakdowns and recaps linked in the show notes. So before we, before we kick off today's recording, I've got one more for you. E Commerce costs are rising. USPS changes alone could push delivery costs, uh, up more than 25% this year. And to stay competitive, you need a supply chain partner built for scale. And that's what Stored is. A modern 3 PL that unites warehousing, fulfillment and transportation with cloud software for full visibility and control. In 2024 alone, Stord saved customers $130 million in parcel fees and powered nearly 1% of all U.S. black Friday and Cyber Monday sales. Now they're offering a free mystery shopping report. See how your ops and logistics stacks up against competitors with real, actionable insights. Get yours at Stored. Link Mystery and scale smarter with Stored. What is going on, DTC Pod? Today we are joined by Meenakshi Lala, who is the CEO of Urban Stems. And I'm really excited to have this conversation today because, uh, not only does Meenakshi come from an exceptional background as it pertains to fashion and very popular consumer brands that you guys are all familiar with, but, uh, when it comes to operating a flower business online, it isn't necessarily the easiest thing. So there to. In order to achieve the scale that you guys have done, you need to really have your operations in order. And today we're going to be diving into everything about what it takes to, to grow and scale, um, one of the largest and most successful businesses in the floral space. So, uh, without further ado, Meenakshi, let's get into it. Why don't you give us a little bit of background about yourself, your career. What led you into the CEO role at, uh, uh, Urban Stems.

Speaker B: Hi, so nice to meet you and thank you for having me here. Very excited to share my story and share the story of Urban Stamps. I spent two decades of my life, um, in various sized businesses within the fashion retail vertical, uh, businesses at different stages of their life cycle. And, um, you know, when I'm asked this question now, I say, well, I came to flowers because I wanted to do something harder. Uh, but obviously it's a joke, but in reality it's the truth. Perishable product and florals specifically within perishable are by far um, the hardest product category to be in. But I have tremendous, you know, I've been blessed with um, the opportunity to work for tremendous businesses in fashion, retail businesses at every scale of their life cycle, various product categories, luxury to contemporary designer. Um, and that sort of, that experience built me and built my career up, um, built my experience portfolio up to really drive operational excellence in this business. And um, for florals, which is a very complex product category by nature of its perishability, being a true operator, being a solid operator, having excellent operational excellence is a given. It's a baseline requirement for coming to this business. Um, I was hired by the prior CEO to come to Urban Sense as the chief operating officer. I spent 18 months in that role, um, bringing all of my experience and learning about the floral space. Candidly, there was so much to learn. This was an industry and a product that I knew nothing about. I am still learning, uh, three years into it, but 18 months, um, of changing how we think about supply chain, changing how we think about scalability, changing how we think about accuracy within planning and forecasting. Um, and from then, um, you know, I was uh, given the honor, uh, by the board and the shareholders to take on the CEO seat. Um, and it's you know, my third year anniversary coming up very soon at Urban Stamps. 30 year anniversary at Urban Stamps, then second year anniversary as CEO of Urban Stats.

Speaker A: Well, well, congrats on that. I'm excited to get into the growth and the story, um, you know, under your leadership. But um, you know, maybe we start with some of your other experience in retail. Um, I'd love to kind of set the stage. You know, you said you worked in, in retail, um, in you know, I think in jewelry and some really popular brands. Could you name those brands that you worked, what your role was and maybe what some of your learnings were, uh, along the way as you were coming up and cutting your teeth in your career?

Speaker B: Absolutely. Um, again as I said, I had the pleasure and honor of working for some privileged noteworthy brands within the fashion retail space. Alice and Olivia, Ellie Tahari, uh, Irving Leger, Elizabeth and James, uh, bcpg, Juicy Couture, um, some really heritage brands, uh, and businesses that the foundation of which was set to really drive innovation, to really drive change in what had become a, um, very mundane sort of expected space. Some of the designers, um, like Alison, Olivia, like Arve Leger, really brought out, uh, innovation, really brought out change. Within, um, fashion. And some of my learnings from working in these businesses were, um, brand sits at the forefront of everything you do. Uh, this is something Ali Taharie taught me. This is something else Olivia taught me. All of the businesses I worked in, trends change, marketing tactics change, acquisition tactics change. But what stays, um, and businesses that succeed are the businesses that stay at front and center of their brand ethos as they stay true to their brand, true to their product. Those are the businesses that continue to grow. Today, this morning, we woke up to the news that Giorgio Armani, um, passed away at 91 years of age. But that is just. That is an example of how a brand continues to maintain its heritage, stay relevant in spite of all of the saturation the vertical has seen by staying true to its brand ethos. Um, and that is the pedigree and knowledge and expertise that I have tried to bring at Urban Stems. And we continue to build on, uh, through the course of my tenure here.

Speaker A: Yeah, I think it's so, so important what you mentioned about brand. Right. Like, all of the brands that you mentioned are household names. They all have a brand. And in essence. And they're not just scale, uh, up changing their identity every, you know, with. With whatever direction the wind changes. They're. They're established brands. They've got identities. And. And that's what makes them, you know, iconic and makes people buy them year in and year out. So I'd love. I think this is a natural point to transition to Urban Stems. Right? Like, you come over, um, you move into an operational role. What does that entail? You said you were doing a lot of learnings along the way. So, you know, what does it mean to be the COO of urban SIMs? What are the duties? What falls onto your desk, and, uh, what did you have to learn on the job as you were getting acquainted with the new space?

Speaker B: So the challenges that I experienced as CEO of Urban Stems were so different than anything I had experienced in my career, uh, up until that point. In a week, I could be, um, talking to my supply chain team about, um, a snowstorm, um, that is supposed to hit, uh, some of the key cities during Valentine's Day. In another week, I could be talking about m, a volcano that has erupted in Ecuador on the mountain that, uh, has a lot of our floral farms. Um, and in another week, it could be, um, dealing with, um, high temperatures that have resulted in now our florals not being able to ship at the highest level of quality and that we want to give our customers. So those challenges were Very unique to me coming from a non perishable product space like fashion, retail, you know. Yes, some will say fashion is perishable too because styles and trends expire, but the physical product doesn't dissipate, which is what happens in, in flowers, when you're working with flowers. And those were, um, challenges that I had not experienced. So there was a lot of learning to be done on how we approach pivoting our supply chain, how we approach dealing with demand, dealing with sourcing in moments like these. And these are real issues that plural businesses experience. Um, fundamentally though, I think what prevailed was through all of our diligence in troubleshooting and problem solving. Fundamentally it's the agility, uh, the innovation, out of the box thinking. Businesses that have agile supply chain and operations facilities, businesses that can pivot, um, and really think about how do you de risk, how do you move your supply chain when moments like this, I mean recently we experienced that with tariffs as well. And some businesses thrived and some businesses really took a hit. So to me, fundamentally as an operator, it's about having a supply chain, having an operational network that is agile and can pivot, um, depending on the challenges you're experiencing.

Speaker A: Yeah. And I think this is such an important point and a topic that we've been talking about a lot because so much uh, on one hand of a brand is what you were saying. It's the brand ethos, the designs, the feeling that it makes the customers feel. But in order to really achieve that, at the end of the day you're running a business and that business needs to be operationally sharp, it needs to deliver the product. And so many things happen behind the scenes to, in your case, get a flower to a customer. Uh, you know, like you were saying, dealing with supply chain that originates maybe in another country, being able to um, store and warehouse that product and store it in a parish that is a perishable product in the states before it makes it out the door. You're dealing with forecasting, you're dealing with, um, you know, a perishable inventory. You're dealing with different product skus and how they're arranged. So there's so many moving parts. Um, and I'm really excited to go deeper into this, but maybe before we do that, I'd love if you could just characterize the landscape. Right. Like where does urban stem sit in this landscape? If you could walk us through even just like a brief history, call it of like the E Commerce ification of flowers. Right. Because it wasn't so long ago when, you know, buying flowers on the Internet, this was not an option. And then we, we kind of saw a boom. And now it's like, maybe the most convenient way to do it. If you're not in a location where you have a, uh, local florist that, you know, you know, and it's an easy way to get exactly what you want when you want it, or say you want to deliver to, you know, a friend or a loved one on the other side of the country. You know, you can't just go to your local florist and say, hey, you know, I want these flowers for my friend on the other side of the country. So, um, yeah, why don't you just walk us through the landscape? What is it like?

Speaker B: Yeah. So the floral industry is an extremely, um, complex, but a very unique and interesting industry. Um, for, for as a consumer, if you want flowers, there are so many channels that you can, um, obtain flowers through. You can go to your grocery store and get flowers. You can, like you said, reach out to a local florist and get your flowers. Um, you can grow them yourself like a lot of people like to. But fundamentally that is when you are servicing yourself, um, when you think about gifting or sending, which is what Urban stems does, when you want to gift a loved one, when you want to gift. Covid was a perfect example of when you couldn't see your loved ones, you couldn't see your friends and family, you couldn't wish people or be with them during, uh, moments of when they had experienced loss. Sending them flowers, uh, was a big sentiment. Was a huge sentiment. That's what businesses like urban stems do. And that's where the e commerce, the evolution of flowers has existed. The complexity continues to drive the how and how businesses continue to evolve within floral e commerce and why that didn't prominently exist years prior was, um, because shipping flowers in a box is extremely complex. The entire, uh, process, supply chain process for bringing flowers into the country or bringing them to you as a consumer is what we call cold chain. Flowers have to travel. Refrigerated flowers do not thrive in temperatures, um, outside of 37, 38 degrees to 50 degrees. Anything warmer or cooler will kill the flowers. Um, and that is very, very complex to achieve and maintain from a supply chain standpoint. So within e commerce there are two, um, most common ways to fulfill flowers are, you know, what, what we call wire service, which is a business, you know, like a 1-800-flowers, collects your order, passes it to a local florist, who then fulfills for you um, that's great. In big cities like New York City and la, where there are incredible florists who can put together an amazing arrangement to make it look exactly like what you purchased. But when you start going to your point to like smaller local, uh, cities and local towns around the country, it's demand and supply. Those floors are not necessarily sitting with all the stems that are featured on the site at all times. And that's where substitution comes in your play. So as a consumer, your vision for what you ordered may not be delivered. And the other example is, uh, a ton of e commerce businesses shipped farm direct, where the product has to travel from the farms to your home, in which case you have to place your order three, four, five days, um, before your expected delivery date. And we all know, thanks to Amazon, we are also trained to receive our product today or tomorrow, the same day and next day. Delivery sentiment is big, especially in the plural space. Because if you hear today, uh, oh, someone lost a member of their family and you want to send them flowers, you're not waiting a week, uh, to send them flowers. You want your flowers to get to them the next day. Um, Urban Stems has this unique supply chain where we source our inventory with our farms. Our New York studio designs all of our bouquets, uh, with our farms in partnership with our farms. We work with farms around 13 countries around the world and we, we bring in the product in country to United States through cold chain. It's all end to end refrigerated. The product is then housed in seven refrigerated fulfillment centers around the country. Because again, like florals have to ship in 24 hours, they have to get to you in 24 hours. Um, and depending on your geography and your order placement, timing, the product is then delivered to you from one of the fulfillment centers. So that's what makes us unique. Urban Stems can truly stand out and say to you, not only are you getting high quality, high design, which to me by the way, is table stakes, if you are going to be a floral business, you better be shipping high quality flowers because you're not in the business to ship that flowers to your customers. So that's table stakes. But what Urban Stems can confidently stand for is you will get what you see, what you order is what you what will be delivered to you. There will not be substitutions and you will get them same day and next day. So your date, the date that is really critical, whether it's a birthday or an anniversary or a Valentine's day or a Mother's Day, your flowers will be delivered, uh, on that day.

Speaker A: Wow. So that's really impressive from, uh, a supply chain perspective in terms of what's happening under the hood. So you're basically saying that when, you know, if I place a same day order, these are flowers that are coordinated, probably coming from another country into the States the day of, and then basically the next day they're being arranged. Right. Because obviously that there's, there's an operational element on the fulfillment side of having to arrange them. So how, how does that happen? Because like you're not getting the, the, the florist isn't in, you know, another country arranging the flowers, you guys are getting the products and then you have to assemble them in, in the U.S. is that right?

Speaker B: No. So actually the farm. So our design and merchandising team travel to the farms around the world that we work with and work with them on the design and planting process. We forecast our planting cycles a year out. So, for example, the product that we are going to sell on Valentine's Day this year is forecasted for, it's planted, it's growing on the farms as we speak. Um, that inventory is committed to. But we have also trained our farms over the years to work with us and build the bouquets for us. So they do indeed put the bouquets together for us at the farm. So whether it's a farm in Ecuador or Holland or Colombia, those farms are putting the bouquets together. But to our recipes, to our design, we send them, um, spec sheets that are, uh, written specifically to, down to the stem length, um, of what your bouquet stem length should be. And it's qc. So if your stem length is an inch or two shorter, it will be rejected at quality control. Rest assured, you are not going to get a bouquet with shorter stems than what we asked for because as the consumer, we want you to have the best physical experience and the product on your table to look as close as it does in that professional shot that you, that you see on the website. So the product then in bouquet form travels through refrigerated supply chain and comes into United States. Our fulfillment centers can QA each bouquet to make sure they are excellent quality before it is then put in a box and shipped to you to enjoy on your, on your dining table or a coffee table.

Speaker A: Awesome. Um, one thing I'd love to talk about while we're on the topics of international supply chains, we've obviously had a lot going on with tariffs and then obviously you're dealing with, um, customs on every single order and you know, products can get caught up in customs or inspected by, you know, all sorts of agencies. But for you guys and a product that needs to happen, um, you know, so quickly, how are you able to ensure that, uh, you know, you're able to keep that supply chain moving? Because like, for example, like if your product is perishable and it's coming in and you know, someone says, oh well let's inspect this and it's a Friday and then the next thing you know it's a sun, a, ah, Monday and you're like, wait, where? My product's still not here. So how do you guys manage, um, you know, think about supply chain given, uh, the stakes of your product and, and how it's perishable. Sure.

Speaker B: So, um, two parts to the question. I'll talk about tariffs first. So tariffs are an ongoing challenge, um, in the geopolitical climate that we are living in. However, the approach urban stems has taken is our consumers value curation and quality. They value, um, premium bouquets that are designed for them with high quality stems. Our consumers are very savvy, they're very smart. They know the product, they know what it takes to bring those premium stems from around the world to their table. As long as the curation is high end and high quality and personalized, they are willing, um, to invest more dollars in the bouquets that are being offered to them. So the approach that we've taken is we're not just going to increase our prices, we're not going to go for that model. We are going to change our assortment to be high design, high curated. So when I'm coming to you and charging you x percent higher than what you typically pay for a bouquet, the value you're getting from the bouquet is obvious. It's not just in increasing the price, but is in offering you a more, um, unique and curated arrangement for your table. And our customers have really responded well to that. Um, the other element of how do we manage supply chain, the shelf life of our product once it hits our fulfillment centers is five days. If it doesn't sell it in five days, that's the end of the lifecycle of that product. Which means it gets tossed, uh, out because it is no longer shippable. So not having, um, a robust supply chain that ensures there are no delivery delays is life and death for this business. Because if that delivery delay does slide in a week, we will have no inventory to sell. Um, weekly inventory is received at our seven fulfillment centers. So product comes in on a weekly basis from all our farms around the world. And for five, we have a five day window to sell and fulfill the product before our next tranche of inventory comes in. Um, the accuracy, the delivery accuracy takes, it's mobilized by several of our team members around the country who work very closely with every partner that is involved in the supply chain. Right from our farms to our trucking partners, to the airlines, our logistics partners, to receiving it, um, in the United States States and having agriculture inspected to then putting it on refrigerated tucks to get to the fulfillment center. Every step of the way. We have, um, you know, our team on the ground ensuring that there are no slips, there are no misses, that if there are any challenges or hurdles, we are reacting and responding to them as quickly as possible.

Speaker A: Okay, so I want to get into, uh, I want to get into the last mile part of the delivery and the customer experience and that end of the fulfillment side because that's, that's a beast all of in itself. But while we're on the topic of this, what you just said, you said, you know, you've got five days, you have a perishable product. How do you guys think about and how do you manage the processes that are related to like inventory projections and management and getting as close to the ideal, uh, you know, purchasing volume for your sales? How do you match those up and how do you reconcile it? I know you said you're projecting way out, but like, how close are you guys able to come and how do you make all of that happen?

Speaker B: Yep. So planning and forecasting is a beast in this space. Um, we have a team of planners who have extremely valuable experience from having worked in perishable products in their prior life. But they study our demand cycles, they study our consumer behavior, they study trends, they study, um, we feed a lot of, uh, fashion strengths in our design and merchandising process. So our planning team and our merchants were very closely to, um, what we call bet on the volumes per SKU for each seasonality to ensure that we are truly understanding why we want to put certain amount of inventory in a certain skew and when do we want to amp it up in a certain cyclical cycle and then, you know, bring it down. As an example, the day after Valentine's Day. The entire Valentine's Day assortment, the red and pink bouquets mean nothing to anyone. No one wants a red SKU the day after Valentine's Day Day. No one wants a red skew the day after Christmas. Um, no one wants a, uh, purple or pale pink skew after Mother's Day. Uh, so we really, really have to ensure that uh, the collections are very specific to those holidays because the consumer is looking for a very specific color palette, is looking for very specific stamps, and we are purchasing enough to hit our revenue numbers, but not low enough. Where we are managing, um, what we call spoilage is a critical term in the industry, which is the inventory that doesn't get sold. Um, so net net, we have really brought a lot of um, accuracy in our planning and forecasting cycles to effectively, effectively be able to manage our spoilage rates. Over the years, uh, we have brought a ton of efficiency. We used to um, you know, run in multiple points of spoilage to now being in low single digits, which is a huge accomplishment for the business. And this goes towards um, the ethos of what we have been running the business. Principles of high operational efficiency. Um, and that, this goes back to my original point of when you're running a business which is a perishable product business, being an operator, um, is critical to how we think and how we operate and how we run this business.

Speaker A: Yeah, I love all these concepts. It's actually funny. It was uh, the podcast that we just had. I had one of the heads of supply chain on who built some of the supply chains for literally most of the most popular CPG brands that, that we know. And we were just talking about how supply chain in of itself is not only an art, but it's a, it's a moat. Right? It's, it's hard, but it means not everyone can do it. So when you're able to build a robust supply chain and you're able to get your spoilage rates down and do all this, it creates a moat for your company and your business. Because I'm sure there's a lot of people who'd be like, oh, I'd love to start a, uh, you know, a D2C flower business. But it's like if you don't have the operational chops and the supply chain built out, it's, it's, you know, it's something that's, it's very hard to do. And getting it right, you know, builds your. It is, it is a massive business mode.

Speaker B: It absolutely is. Supply chain is the, the heart, it is the spine of a business. The. Especially when it comes to perishable product. Um, without a robust supply chain team and a robust operational team, businesses cannot thrive, uh, in this, ah, you know, especially in this environment that we are in today.

Speaker A: So let's talk about um, you know, now let's talk about fulfillment, uh, as it pertains to the customer. Right. Um, what do you guys need to do from an operational, like a packing sort of thing from a customer communications point of view, you know, what is the package that the customer is receiving and what are the inputs that go into, other than the flowers, of course, but like, what are the inputs that go into that customer experience? So, you know, they get a, you know, a perfect bouquet of flowers just as they see it, uh, as they shop.

Speaker B: Absolutely. So the product arrives at our fulfillment centers, as I said, with refrigeration, it is refrigerated end to end. It is then stored in refrigerated coolers, um, in all of our facilities. So it sits at the optimal temperature as orders are collected against them. The product is then hydrated, uh, for 24 hours before it's packed. Uh, and the intent of doing that is so that as a consumer, when you receive the flowers, it is in that perfect stage where it is bloomed, but not fully bloomed, but not in complete bud form. So you can enjoy it as the recipient of the flowers, you can enjoy it by. But also the product needs to have enough what we call vase life, it's a technical term in the floral space. It has a long ways life for you to continue to enjoy it while it's sitting at your coffee table. Um, and there is a science to it. Every stem has a different vase life. Every stem M has a different cut stage. So our design team spends a lot of time studying the cut stages and the vase life of each stem wick our farms to ensure that all the stems that are being chosen for a certain bouquet not just aesthetically look great, but also have similar vase life. So you don't have one stem dying before the others do, or you don't have just the greens thriving while your focal flowers, um, have all perished. So to ensure that the life of that bouquet, um, and you're able to enjoy the full beauty of the bouquet as it's meant to be, as it was designed, there's a lot of ways, like testing that has to be done before the assortment is finalized. So once the bouquet is then hydrated and packed and your last mile delivery service then picks it up and delivers it to you upon unboxing. The box has very specific care instructions. It has instructions about the flowers that are in your bouquet, tells you what flowers you have in your bouquet, tells you how to care for them. Um, there is flower food that is, uh, enclosed in all of our bouquets. We always tell you go with what the expression tell you Use the flower foods. There's a lot of tips and tricks the Internet will tell you of course, have fun with it, experiment it. But fundamentally the flower food and clean water is all your flowers need. We uh, tell you about how often the flowers need to be changed, how do you style it and if you click on um, you know, if you go to our site, you typically receive a post, um, post delivery email correspondence from uh, Urban Stems that will tell you all the tips and tricks to keep your flowers happy and healthy, uh, so you can enjoy them for a long time on your table. And our site will tell you if you um, search for a certain stem or a certain bouquet and want to know about the origin of the stems or where the flowers came from or why they were chosen for that particular sentiment. There's a lot of information on our site as well.

Speaker A: So how do you manage the like the number of skus and arrangements and all of that you have versus the physical packaging that you need? Is it like, like are you dealing with custom packaging per uh, per sku or like how, how does that work? Because that's a whole nother beast.

Speaker B: It's a whole other beast. So yes, there is a lot of different packaging sizes that our fulfillment centers have to store because again you're dealing with a very delicate product. You cannot put a very large bouquet in a really small box. Um, we all know what that, what'll happen with that when it's in transit. It isn't a product with a finite shape. Florals flowers are living, um, you know, living stones and they're extremely delicate. So if they're packed tightly, they will be ruined. What we call mechanical damage. They would have tons of mechanical damage before they get to you. So each, so throughout the development and the design process, our design team, uh, not, not only do they work with supply chain on defining what each stem and each bouquet is, and then they work on waste life testing as I explained earlier, to make sure that the stem life, all of those was sim. Um, they also do packaging testing. So each bouquet is then tested to the various packaging sizes and options that are available for us. And the spec sheet that is provided to the fulfillment center indicates exactly what packaging should be used for each sku. So that packer at the warehouse was, when they pick a bouquet, the purchase order has a spec sheet attached to it which tells them exactly what the stems are, how many stems are on that bouquet, how it should be hydrated, how it should be packed, uh, and which size of box it should be packed, what kind of Collateral needs to go in it. All of those specifications are attached to the purchase order for that picker.

Speaker A: Wow. I mean, uh, it's super complex. And again, the theme of our whole conversation has been like, sometimes, you know, you get this amazing customer experience, but you don't understand all the elements that go into it. But it's fun being able to speak with an operator who's having to oversee and understand all the elements that go into delivering a product like that. So I think this is a natural transition for talking about what, what did it look like moving from CEO into CEO? Like what, what changed in your role and your responsibilities? What changed about how you thought about the business? Um, just walk me through that transition in stepping into that role before I answer that question.

Speaker B: This is a line I always quote, um, from Devil vs Prada, when Meryl Streep talks about the cerulean blue sweater and how she talks about, um, Anne Hathaway probably has no idea how much effort has gone into picking that exact color of sweater for her. That is exactly how it sits in. I truly believe in every vertical in life, um, the consumer who receives that bouquet, uh, has no idea about everything that has gone into, um, you know, putting that bouquet together, shipping and curating it and getting it to their table. But the more we talk about this and the more, uh, you know, people learn, I think, I hope that consumers will have an appreciation for all those brands and businesses out there, um, and how much due diligence goes into getting product, uh, to their daily lives.

Speaker A: No, absolutely. It's, it's. Sometimes it's the simplest things that you take for granted that you don't realize how many, how many touch points have to happen. And, you know, I just appreciate being able to chat with someone who's really involved on the operation side because oftentimes there's a lot of people who are on the marketing side of things, or maybe, uh, the finance side of things, who don't understand the operational challenges that have to happen to be able to pull off, um, you know, that end customer experience. So it's always fun to be able to go down the rabbit hole with, uh, with someone who oversees all that sort of stuff. So, yeah, and I guess that takes me into my next question is like, what did that transition look like? What changed? Um, you know, how does having operated as a CEO affect the way you think as a CEO? Um, yeah, just talk us through all of that.

Speaker B: Absolutely. So, um, I think fundamentally, uh, not a lot has changed from a perspective of this business or any business. There are two pillars, uh, in my eyes to building a successful business. Operational excellence is one, um, especially when it comes to perishable product. But I'm sure this fundamentally applies to every other product category. Having operational excellence in a business allows for, uh, the roots of the business, the structure, the foundation of the business to be, um, a solid high margin business, to drive profitability, to drive revenue growth. Having your foundation established to drive an efficient business is critical. Um, so continuing to embrace operational excellence and continuing to grow, um, efficiencies in all operational channels within the business was front and center at all times. Um, and I, you know, I mentioned this in the early part of our podcast. Having a brand first approach, having grown in the fashion pedigree, having grown and lived with um, incredible, uh, fashion designers, brand has always been front and center in the approach that I have taken in any business that I've worked in, in any role that I've worked in. So when I took uh, the role of CEO on Urban Stamps, the approach was to build brand recognition, to build brand awareness. It's an incredible brand. The product that we create is incredible. Um, we have extremely high brand loyalty. Um, how do we communicate that, how do we resonate that with our customers? How does our customer hear um, more about who we are and what we do and how do we acquire um, additional customers, uh, by brand awareness? So that was front and center and a shift in approach. Um, and again to me it's continuing to build on fundamentals of who we are and what we do. We deliver high quality, high design product. We are a gifting business. That is who we are building up strategically on. Um, the differentiators that we bring to the table, um, as compared to our peers in this space are things that we have worked on. And most importantly, um, you know, something I have learned, uh, being in fashion retail is always listen, listening to your customer. What is your customer telling you about the experience, about the product? What we have recognized is our customers always said to us they want curation, they want ease, they want agility, uh, if we are giving them a seamless ordering experience, if we are doing careful curation, uh, for the moments that they want to gift, um, urban stems for, there is no um, holding them back, uh, in terms of price barriers. In terms of loyalty, today's consumer is extremely vigilant and extremely smart. Loyalty is not something that we can um, take for granted. Uh, loyalty has to be one with every transaction. Even if you are repeat customer, we have to continue servicing you in a way where we win your Loyalty, Um, and that is by offering them careful curation, by offering them a seamless, uh, shopping experience, a seamless journey, a more agile shopping journey. Um, as a brand we continue to build on that. Our customers have time and again told us that they want us to be the one stop shop for all their gifting needs. Um, we have now started integrating food bundles with our offerings. Um, our most prominent food bundle on our site, uh, right now is what we call our Autumn Bundle, which is Levaine Cookies and Urban Stems Flowers. It's a nostalgic New York brand, um, that our customers had really responded to. Uh, sending these nostalgic Levain cookies with flowers for a birthday, um, is hands down one of the most well received, uh, curated bundles that we have been able to put out for our customers. Um, by offering some personalization, um, tools on our site. Um, we have a video message tool on Urban Stance where you can record a video message for your loved one across the country. Um, where you can, um, you know, talk to your custom talk to your recipient while not being next to them or not being with them. So think about like a mother whose son just, or daughter just went to college, uh, and she's missing their voice and missing having them at home and if the kid sends them flowers, being able to hear it with your video message. So these are just some elements of, you know, curation and personalization that they've added in the recent times based on all of the feedback that our customers have given to us. Um, and again, as I said, you know, fundamentally it's still the three things. It's operational excellence, um, brand first approach and listening to the customer.

Speaker A: And then how do you think about growth? Right, like, so in the CEO role, obviously we've got brand as the forefront. We're coming in, we're making sure people understand what our brand is about. We know it's rooted in excellence. We know they're going to get the, uh, you know, the best bouquets and they're going to have that quality. The operational excellence is going to be there. But when it comes to our customer acquisition, like, how do you, how do you think about it? Like, what are the opportunities? Obviously we've talked about like, you know, gifting and relationships and bundles and all these different things. But, um, you know, as you think about growth, like, what are some of the most exciting, what are some of the most reliable, like, channels for you guys? And then what are some of the most things that get you excited as, as we look forward as it pertains to growth?

Speaker B: Yeah, so the most reliable long term growth channel is brand. It's organic. Right? Um, there is no substitution to brand loyalty, there is no substitution to brand awareness. If you as a consumer, if, if urban sense is top of mind to you, if we can establish that um, that uh, stickiness with you as a consumer, um, that is a winning formula. Uh, but that is not a short term formula. That is a long term investment and a long term formula and you have to consistently show up with equality. Um, and ah, a seamless delivery and ordering experience for your consumer to get sticky to your brand. Um, so that to me is the long term growth play. M. How do we get. There is um, some of the examples I gave you is, is solutioning for our customers needs, uh, hearing the customer. What are you looking for? What can drive um an all year round business? How do we create moments of sending flowers when you're not thinking about flowers for you? Um, Valentine's Day and Mother's Day are the most obvious holidays when you think about sending flowers. But how do we convert every single occasion in your life to be a floral gifting occasion or a floral gifting moment? How do we create that stickiness with you as a consumer? And that we believe is by doing careful curation. So some of the play that we are going after is creating these um, opportunities and creating these uniquely curated bundles that will allow you to, whether it's by moments, whether it's by marketing campaign ideas or it's by careful product curation is to remind you of a nostalgia, remind you of a moment, remind you of a loved one that is far away. Um, and helping you think about them, but also helping you think about urban stems as the solution for showing up in your loved ones lives. Um, and that is how we believe we will grow this business by creating um, more gifting moments out of um, nostalgia, out of sentiments, um, and out of you know, candidly trends.

Speaker A: Yeah. And what I think is really interesting here, what I'm hearing is basically like you know there's, there's two options. You can either go acquire a bunch more customers for uh, you know, fill up your top of funnel for the things that they're already used to do or you can build that uh, you know, customer lifetime value by helping them understand and unlock uh, you know, different things. I mean one thing I'm looking at your site right now and like literally under the header which shows like great moments of you know, people with their bouquets and in video form you come right down in. The first thing that you see is Flowers and gifts for every occasion. So now you're already putting it into the mind. It's not just like, hey, look at these flowers that you're already planning for. You're like, wait a minute, is it for a birthday? Is it, Are we shopping for sympathy, for thank you, for friendship, for love? Just because. Um, so I think taking that approach is a really novel way to approach a business. On one hand it's like, what's the, what's the thing that's going to carry us in the long term? And that's something that you've learned which is brand. And then also how do we, you know, let's focus on the customer base that already trusts us, that knows our product and let's get them buying into it more as opposed to just saying, oh, let's go compete for you know, a uh, single one time purchaser who's looking for Mother's Day flowers who's you know, not going to come back and be like one with the ecosystem. So for me as an operator, I mean that's something that um, you know, really resonates and it's cool to see that from a strategic lens for, for how you guys are implementing that. Um, you know, as we kind of wrap up here, um, the last question I have for you is, uh, you know, what are some of your biggest learnings that you've had in the CEO role over the last year? Uh, you've, you know, and what are some of the things that you're looking to apply and grow towards, uh, you know, in the next couple years at the helm?

Speaker B: I think some of the biggest learnings have been never, uh, take your customer for granted. Um, customers today, as I said earlier, uh, loyalty is not a given. Loyalty, uh, has to be earned. Um, you have to continue to show up for your customer with every transaction, um, they make with you. Um, you have to continue to elevate your game. Complacency, um, and being laid back about what you do well is no longer ah, a tactic for success. Us. Um, I think another learning has been, um, uh, learning or more, I would say more than a learning. It's been a revalidation of fundamentally what I have been taught by my mentors, um, over the last few decades, uh,

Speaker A: is

Speaker B: the nuances of the environment, the macro, the geopolitical environment, all of the above are constantly fluctuating. Brands that are leaders that will continue to thrive and succeed are leaders that display agility, smart thinking, um, operate with um, a lean structure and that are able to pivot, um, when challenged when they face challenges, whether they're environmental challenges like a snowstorm or earthquake or it's tariffs in a certain part of the world. So maintaining that ability to be, no matter how big a business you grow into, um, being agile and being able to pivot, uh, and being a quick thinker is what will make a business successful. And that is something we continue to remind ourselves every day.

Speaker A: I love that. Um, and as we wrap up here, Meenakshi, why don't you just shout out, um, where can we connect with you? Where can we follow along, uh, with the journey? Um, this has been super, uh, fun to get all the way into the weeds, uh, no pun intended if you will. But, uh, uh, yeah, why don't you shout out your socials or where can we find you? And where can we find more about Urban Stems?

Speaker B: Thank you. Uh, Urban Stems. You can, uh, check out our site, urbanstems.com and our Instagram and TikTok handle is at Urban Stems, so please follow us there. Uh, my personal handle, if you want to continue to, um, follow my journey or you know, get in touch with me just to chat about something to do with florals or not, uh, my LinkedIn, um, handle is the best way to get in touch with me. It's Meenakshilala. You will find me there. And if you want to follow me on Instagram and my journey at, uh, Urban Stems as well, my Instagram handle is at Minu M I N U la.

Speaker A: Love it. Well, thank you so much for coming on the pod. We learned a ton, um, and we'll have to have you back and continue this convo, uh, in the future.

Speaker B: Sounds great. Thank you so much for having me.

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