“You have to approach [planning] in a way that encompasses the real needs of the marketplace and is both responsive and agile.”

– Glenn Pascrell, Senior Vice President of Merchandise Planning & Market Analytics for Citizen Watch America

Glenn Pascrell is the Senior Vice President of Merchandise Planning & Market Analytics for Citizen Watch America. In the 14+ years he has been at the company, more and more scope has been added to his role. He started with responsibility for purchasing and inventory management and over time added demand planning, competitive analysis for product pricing, gross profit management and market analytics. The primary objective of his role is to understand Citizen Watch America’s market share and competitors’ movements in the market.

Glenn recently presented at the Institute for Business Forecasting’s Best Practices Conference, talking about the importance of integrated sales and operations planning (S&OP).

In this interview, Glenn shares some highlights from his presentation as well as his key takeaways from the other speakers and sessions with Supply Chain Now Radio host Scott Luton:

• Top down and bottom up forecast reconciliation
• The limitations of AI and the importance of healthy skepticism
• Rethinking the role and function of planning, balancing the need to integrate it effectively into other business processes while also allowing it to remain independent

[00:00:05] It’s time for Supply Chain Now Radio. Broadcasting live from the Supply chain capital of the country, Atlanta, Georgia. Supply chain. Now radio spotlights the best in all things supply chain the people. The technology’s the best practices and the critical issues of the day. And now here are your hosts.

[00:00:29] Hey, good morning. Scott Luton here with you. Lively Supply Chain Now Radio. Welcome to the show. On this episode, we’re going to be speaking with an exceptional supply chain leader in the retail industry to get his key takeaways from a big recent trades show. So stay tuned for that quick programing note. Like all of our series on Supply Chain Now Radio, you can find our replays on a wide variety of channels Apple podcasts, SoundCloud, YouTube, where you get your podcast from. As always, we’d love to have you subscribe. Still missing thing. Let’s think all of our sponsors for allowing us to bring best practices and innovative ideas to you. Our audience. The Effective syndicate Spend Management Experts Supply chain real estate dot com talentstream and many more. You can check out our sponsors on the show notes of this episode. Let’s welcome in our featured guest today, Glenn Pascrell, Senior Vise President, Merchandise Planning and market analytics with Citizen Watch America. Glenn, how are you doing?

[00:01:24] Very good, Scott. Hey, don’t it?

[00:01:26] It’s great to reconnect with you. We enjoyed meeting in person down in Florida. I think last spring it that the velocity event, which was a home run event, that where you gave a keynote. And it’s great to have you back on the show.

[00:01:41] That was a great event. And thank you for having me back.

[00:01:44] You bet. That was a great event. Looking forward to Velocity 2020. I think that’ll be down in Florida once more. But for maybe our listeners, that didn’t catch that episode, which, gosh, it seems like six years ago that was only a few months ago, but it still seems like a long time.

[00:02:00] I don’t know why.

[00:02:02] So let’s let’s get in a little better for anyone that might have missed that show. What? Tell us about yourself where you grew up, Glenn.

[00:02:10] Yes, I grew up in Patterson, New Jersey, which is the third largest city in New Jersey. It’s about 20 minutes west of New York City. It’s a big old industrial city. One of the first planned industrial cities. And I guess its claim to fame in addition to being the first planned industrial city in America, because we had the great silk production manufacturing signs that utilized the power of the Great Falls. So there’s a great falls in Paterson that used to generate the Jaccard looms that would make the fabrics in and in it. And we had a sister city, I know, in Leone, France, which did the same thing. A that’s where we kind of inherited the Jaccard new technology. And there’s a great museum in downtown Paterson.

[00:03:07] It has the history of the Silk City, as it’s known. This city. Yeah.

[00:03:15] You learn something new every day. So. So, Glenn, you are the pride of Paterson, New Jersey, is that what you’re telling me?

[00:03:22] Well, maybe my dad is. I mean, he was even the mayor of Patterson elevator. He was the Mayor Patterson for for a couple of terms and then a state assemblyman and now a congressman even into his 80s. Why a U.S. representative from our district, which covers Patterson and other townships. And in Passaic, in Essex. In Bergen County.

[00:03:46] Mm hmm. How far do you away? Do you live from Paterson now?

[00:03:51] So I lived in Montclair, New Jersey, which is about 20 minutes south of Paterson. Just a straight shot down the great on New Jersey. Garden State Parkway.

[00:04:03] Twenty minutes from the Souq City. Good deal. Well, hey, let’s talk a little bit about what you did prior to your current role with Citizen Watch America. In a nutshell, tell us about your professional journey.

[00:04:15] Yeah, well, I went to Fordham University, a Jesuit university in the Bronx. Their main campus is called Rosehill and it’s great because it’s right next to the Belmont area awaking and great Italian food and it’s also adjacent to the Botanical Gardens in the Bronx and to the Bronx Zoo itself. So I went there as an undergrad and as a graduate student. I guess that I graduated around 1990, I think, and then and then pursued a master’s degree and a few years later had a masters in economics from there, which I which I drove to when I was an undergrad. I lived on campus. And then it was interesting because I did a variety of things. I was a woodworker for years when I was in school and college, cabinetmaking making. We did kitchen cabinets, displays for the North Children’s Museum, mantel pieces for fireplaces, all sorts of things and got real great experience and made good money too. So it was tough to transition into and to white collar, if you will work. I do like that reference, but you know, so I did. So I did woodworking when I graduated from college. That was about 1990 that we had. I don’t know. If you recall, we had a kind of a mini recession that was the last Gulf War then. And and believe it or not, I was laid off and the gentleman hired me, was so sorry about it, but just didn’t have enough business cards. I said, oh, I guess I got to get a desk job now. Do you still do?

[00:06:04] Do you still you know, you spend some time woodworking now. Is that it was a hobby as well?

[00:06:11] Yeah, I well I’m not as much as I’d like to. Let me put it that way. But I do I still have a strong interest in it and I’m waiting to unleash that. We’re still in an apartment in Montclair and we’ve been looking for a home for a while. So I can’t wait to get a home to do. But my skills to work again, hopefully they’re not too rusty.

[00:06:34] So after you separated earlier in your career from the Woodwork Woodworking organization, what was next for you?

[00:06:45] It was a little bit strange. And in an interesting way, the I I was a.

[00:06:55] I worked as a fraud investigator for the state of New Jersey, unemployment and disability fraud. And it allowed me great freedom to pursue a master’s degree at the same time. So I did that for maybe two or three years. And then when I completed my masters, I remember almost unanimously in the office, everyone saying, why are you still working here? We don’t have undergraduate degrees, let alone master’s degrees. I think you need to move on and pursue something more challenging.

[00:07:30] And and so I. So I did. At the time I applied to the FBI, into the DEA and the DEA, I went through the whole process with them and they wanted to hire me.

[00:07:44] And then I changed my mind and then applied to the prosecutor’s office in Persay County. And they also that went through. And then it decided at the end not that they were going to put me up in the white collar crime and government corruption unit. And I said, you know, I kind of changed my mind a little bit. And then someone came to me and said, well, you know, your skills are very translatable to the corporate world. And I then started to interview around. And that’s when my older brother said, you know, I have a friend networks that at the Time Warner Lambert, which became Pfizer, the consumer health care division.

[00:08:30] They have an opportunity. So that’s what I I went in for that interview.

[00:08:34] I don’t know what the heck I was talking about. I don’t think the rest. I had no corporate experience. I had no idea how my skills in economics and international economics would translate to the business world or if I’d use them at all. But I must have made up a good enough story, Scott, because they hardly unless now maybe 97.

[00:08:57] I want to say my. Yes. Yeah.

[00:09:01] So kind of your first foray into the End to end supply chain was as a forecast. Analysts often fall and you’re right.

[00:09:09] It’s all right. That’s right. And they and their consumer health care division. Now, how long were you in that role? I’d just a year I stayed with the company. I was in dad three different teams. I was in the upper respiratory.

[00:09:24] I manage the upper respiratory business. So I was my first time we used MRI data, which was that syndicated sell through data because, you know, drugstores, supermarkets, Daryl, their data’s all open. You know, you just have to buy it. And it’s a lot different in the in the watch and jewelry business. But it’s always very open. And we had big customers like Wal-Mart and Kmart, which were which were becoming huge at the time. And they had score cards and we were like category captains. And it was a really good initial place to to get my feet wet and cut my teeth on that. What it means to be a forecast analyst and what it means to use data outside data, because we used allergy seasonal allergy data. And it was it was a good learning experience.

[00:10:22] Well, let’s fast forward to your current role. When did you when did you join Citizen Watch America?

[00:10:29] My joints Dickerson watch at the end of 2005. OK. And so I’ve been here about 14, just over 14 years now. OK. So, yeah. So Senior Vise President, merchandise planning and market analytics. Where do you spend most your time, Glenn?

[00:10:45] So I’m wearing physically in New York City in the Empire State Building. And we my my when I was hired as a director of planning in 2005, they had a small department.

[00:11:02] And basically, the demand planning function didn’t report into me. So at that point, I was just responsible for purchasing and inventory management. GROSS profit calculations. I know we did a lot of gross profit calculations in Excel. So many years ago. And and that I really worked for the gentleman that was doing the new product development for the company. So I was right there at the cutting edge of what was being developed in new watches, the new technology. It was pretty exciting. And his name was Store Zuckerman. He was the first gentleman that hired me. And then over the years, my role has expanded to include the demand planning function as well as to purchasing an inventory piece. Pricing became a responsibility pricing line. So doing competitive analysis for that and also and managing the gross profit and negotiating the costing with the with our parent company in Tokyo and then very involved in the product development team. I was the main person on the team with regard to planning. And we traveled to Tokyo and Hong Kong and that was a lot of funding and a big adventure. And just more recently have had responsibilities for market analytics, which is the newest piece really working with our syndicated data company, NPD Group, as well as other data sources and trying to understand our market share and the competitive movements in the market.

[00:12:55] Well, the value of everyone has heard of Sesson watch. But tell us more about your organization, what the sis and watch America do.

[00:13:03] Yeah. So that’s a great question because it’s a bit more complicated today and it’s a bigger group. So Citizen Watch America comprises the U.S., Canada, Mexico and the U.K. today. So all those markets fall under citizen watch America. And we sometimes refer to ourselves as citizen watch group, because not long after I started in 0 5 Day Citizen a Tokyo a Japanese brand and company, which is, you know, traded on that exchange. And then Nikkei is bought an American watch company called Bolívar Buffers. For many years we were kept as separate companies, managed separately and didn’t communicate with each other directly about a development, market position, positioning, etc.. So that’s all changed in the last few years. We’ve we have an integrated company with Bolívar and also with a bunch of Swiss watch brands that we purchased and are trying to expand our PE now. Frederick const&, Arnold and Son. There’s a whole bunch from there, a fairly small in the US market, so you probably haven’t heard of them, but the idea is to try to expand that vision. And and so the company. Citizen itself, the eponymous brand expanded into, you know, we had this alliance with Disney, so we do Marvel Star Wars. Princess is everything you can imagine. But we also have an integrated Disney so that they their creative department can do any creative we want for our advertising and where we have all the clocks in the Disney World and Disneyland. We have we sponsor a lot of events with them on the bulk of a. They have Caravelle, which now or Accutron, a whole bunch of private label brands, Harley Davidson, Frank Lloyd Wright. And they have big connections with the Latin Grammys and Universal Music. So there’s a lot going on. And then on the European side, as I mentioned, we have a quite a few Swiss watch brands. So it’s a much different company today because we’re a portfolio of brands and we have to consider the brand positioning and where everybody sits. So we’re complementary to each other.

[00:15:45] Really important. All right. So before we get some your insights on this big IBF event that you’re at and spoke at, I got to ask, what what floor is your office on in the Empire State Building?

[00:15:59] So we are on the twenty ninth floor. OK, what’s the view from your office look like?

[00:16:08] I guess I look I guess I look uptown towards our old office, which is the Grand Central Station.

[00:16:24] The Chrysler Building. Grace Plaza. Bank of America. I’m looking uptown. So we’re on Sixth Avenue. Up Fifth Avenue. I’m sorry. And I’m looking up to sixt and looking up Sixth Avenue uptown.

[00:16:42] So but there’s some great people watching throughout the day, watching, looking out the window.

[00:16:51] Yeah. Yes.

[00:16:51] Actually, I had an opportunity to go to I went to an IBF sponsored event at I believe it was Laurie Yel. Mm hmm.

[00:17:01] And they have an office on the west side. Which is beautiful modern building. And. And it was in their cafeteria. They called it. But that incredible view of the East River on the Hudson River, rather. So I was pretty impressed with that. We don’t have that view here, but you see a lot.

[00:17:24] All right. So speaking of IBF list, first off, if you can, with our listeners and I’m sure plenty of our listeners will will know what IBF is, the Institute for Business Forecasting. But tell us about where this event was when it took place. The general theme of this event we’re getting more into.

[00:17:44] Yeah, well, the Institute of Business Forecasting and Planning was created by a man by name Adoctor Jane, and he really was the inspiration for developing a business organization around planning, if you will. And a some of his research he had done in his own p_h_d_ was about this. The event that they have every year is called Jenny Business Planning, Forecasting and as a._p Best Practices Conference.

[00:18:19] And it’s an it was in Orlando, Florida, between the 20th and 23rd of October.

[00:18:28] And they had a leadership forum, different day. And then the second two days, they had a whole bunch of breakout presentations.

[00:18:39] Was this a national event for the IPF organization?

[00:18:43] Right. It was a national ban and they have an international ban coming on. I believe it’s in Amsterdam. And they have quite a few. During the course of the year. But this is the big US one, if you will.

[00:18:55] Gotcha. OK. All right. So let’s talk more about your key takeaways. I know you spoke at the conference and in our pre-show warm up conversation. I know that you also really enjoyed the sidebar conversations and some of the other presentations. Let’s let’s dove into some of your key takeaways from this event, Glenn.

[00:19:15] Yeah, well, I have to say, I guess I have to start with Gary Ridge is the CEO of WD 40.

[00:19:23] He gave the keynote address. The first day, and which would have been, I guess, Tuesday, the first full day, and it was just incredible.

[00:19:38] He’s a very inspiring leader. He he grew up in Australia. He was promoted to president and CEO of WD 40 when he was a fairly young person.

[00:19:51] And he was always interested his whole life in leadership, developing his own leadership skills and culture within the organisation. And so he talked a lot. He didn’t talk about WD 40 as an oil and lubrication company. And, you know, because I thought it was a little bit odd that that that company would present at IDF Sheer. I was completely mistaken because he actually has a very cutting edge company and has built a culture, what he calls a tribe culture. And he even lived with the Aboriginals in Hawaii. Yeah. Sara and you hear every day. No, no. And it was it was odd to hear it, too. I mean, you know, sitting there in the audience and explaining to us how the chiefs in the Aboriginal tribes would go hunting with the boomerangs they use and how they would teach the younger men how to use the boomerang to hunt and how.

[00:21:04] The more.

[00:21:06] Teaching they could do. He called them teaching and learning moments. He has a new book that’s just out and what it would produce more, obviously. Game 4 for consumption. And so he was big on teaching moments because and learning moments as a leader, obviously. But you know them. Your main role is to teach the organization.

[00:21:32] And he he took that away from his. His time with the. In Australia and then moved to. California to run the company, and so that was a big transition for him. But so I have to start there because he was very impressive. His name is Gary Ray J. I highly recommend you read him. He has a new book out. We can eat Scott. We can provide that information later.

[00:22:04] Absolutely. And toward a quick note to our audience, I’m sure most folks listening to this podcast have a can of WD 40 somewhere in their garage. You know, it’s been around for more than 50 years. You know, if you’ve got a piece of machinery that isn’t running smooth, WD 40, Horsfall is what is one of the go tos. And when you share with me the impact of Gary’s presentation, I had to go look up the company a little bit. I’ve never really thought of the company beyond the product, but they are based in San Diego, California.

[00:22:38] And to your San Diego.

[00:22:40] Yeah, beautiful San Diego. And Gary Ridge has been CEO now since 1997. So time and.

[00:22:46] Yeah. Yeah. He really talks about people back. And I think as a result, he has been able to just in the last few years, Dell like quadruple the earnings, they’ve created all a bunch of different products based on feedback from their own employees that have done really well. They talk about creating moments, using their products. It’s more of an emotional connection with the brand than it is a utilitarian one. And so it’s very inspiring.

[00:23:25] And the book that Glen is referencing is Helping People Win at Work. It’s co-written by Ken Blanchard and Gary Ridge. And it must be popular. There’s only one left in stock on Amazon as that right this second. So we’ll provide a direct link to our listeners in the show notes. So clearly, Glen Gary was a great presenter at the IBF event. What else really stood out to you about the event?

[00:23:53] Yeah. We knew there was a. We always have a presentation by Puma. And that was very interesting. That had to do with the top down and bottom up gentleman by the name of Joseph. Ask him Brenner, who I’ve met at these events and does a great job of that. In this case, explaining.

[00:24:22] How you top down and bottom up in terms of forecast reconciliation are really critical pieces of an a._p process, monthy process. There were so many good presentations. There was a woman. Laury Answer from Cardinal Health.

[00:24:43] There’s a gentleman.

[00:24:46] I think his name is Eric Wilson, who is from Escalate Sports. Eric Wilson. He talked about a I and we had a good breakout conversation about artificial intelligence, its limitations, but also where or how it might develop in the future.

[00:25:06] You know, we talked a bit about the difficulty in specifying the right answer for the algorithm to answer the right question for the algorithm to answer.

[00:25:21] And it’s tough because there’s a lot of correlation, but there isn’t.

[00:25:26] It’s not clear what the causation is in many of these models. So sometimes it ends up giving you and I think that’s what they’re finding out with self-driving cars, is that there are situations in which the this complex set of algorithms that that the computer goes through instantaneously almost can, can, can be wrong.

[00:25:52] And so a bit of the conversations with regard to a AI or machine learning was about, you know, why it’s gonna be critical that the forecast plan or the future has a more strategic role in the organization and can make decisions and have good judgment to to manage the models, but also the kind of healthy skepticism about some of the results that you might get.

[00:26:31] I also talked about that in my presentation.

[00:26:34] What I mean, speak to that a little bit more. Glen Yeah. It’s important to have a healthy dose of skeptic skepticism in the room as we’re we’re planning and evaluating the demand, right?

[00:26:49] Yeah, absolutely. The.

[00:26:53] I think my presentation was on, you know, an integrated business planning model in which it kind of culminated into. But how planning should really be at a hub department with really mitigating managing the conversations between the sales group and the financial group or leadership. The merchandise saying or product development group and the sales group, because there are such competing interests that require really data driven decisions. So, for example. A CFO in a company who’s responsible for controlling the resources and the investments, as well as the overall inventory levels, etc., when capital investments become obsolete and slow the business down. But it’s not going to be able to. He may be able to take to cut the purchases, but he won’t be able to tell you how to do it. And that’s where you really need a planning department that can create to manage those. The direction when cuts have to be made or for that matter, when there’s more investment required because there’s business opportunity that you want to chase. And so to understand the value of that. Of course, the sales organization and leadership is trying to communicate that every day to finance. But there should be a leader in the in merchandise planning to to also make those arguments and to mitigate the risk and to make the changes necessary.

[00:28:56] So in another way, there’s also competing interests between the stakeholders, the product development people, and because they may be getting information that it can only develop a certain number of SKUs or being pushed by sales to say we need more, more and more newness and we have more segmentation than ever before today.

[00:29:19] And so somebody has got to arbitrate those conversations so that you end up in a good place and not over skewed or underdeveloped. In terms of not having enough segmentation to to manage through this new omni channel world.

[00:29:42] If that makes sense. So I really pushed for forecast planners, directors, v.p.’s leaders and the audience and the audience to think about their role a lot differently than they might have historically. Dr. Jain was saying that over 50 percent of. Of demand planners and planning people report to the supply chain. Still such an archaic business model. In my opinion. But I think my opinion is pretty informed. But where should they report to? If they report to sales, you know, you want them to be embedded with the sales group. So they’re following your assumptions and they can make judgments about whether or not those assumptions make any sense. Right. Track against them, you know, and their costs are always changing, especially in today’s disruptive market.

[00:30:39] But.

[00:30:41] I think you know what I mean.

[00:30:42] Yeah, you have to approach it in a way that encompasses the real need of the marketplace and be responsive and agile. You can’t you can’t do that if you’re if your organization if you’re just thinking about your role as well. I’m just a forecast guy. I just create the most accurate forecast for the product line. And then I hand it off to somebody else, whether it be manufacturing or, you know, rolled up to sales or to, you know, to finance. Absolutely not.

[00:31:21] You know, you have to really become very closely aligned with the sales initiatives in your organization to be able to manage forecasts from a macro and a bottom up approach.

[00:31:37] It really requires a new way of thinking, right? It’s not. It can’t. Successfully applied nineteen eighty two approaches to planning and demand planning. To your point in this in this highly disruptive market, right, we’ve got to go. Think about differently and structure a lot differently, right?

[00:32:00] Yes.

[00:32:02] You a AI and machine learning is going to help us with pattern recognition. It’s going to help us do repetitive tasks much better than we can. We talk about A-B-C analysis, focusing on the most important use that give us the biggest return or the biggest gross profit.

[00:32:23] But.

[00:32:26] It’s going to help us do that. Well, what it’s not going to do is is tell you how to manage the whole thing. Right.

[00:32:34] So a big part of what I presented had to do with you were in a very disruptive market with watches. We have smart watches. We have Apple Watch, we have Fitbit and even other traditional watch companies that are, you know, that are all in on the on tracking and in smart like fossile.

[00:33:01] In addition, we have the jewelry and watch market is down, you know, especially in the 50 to fifteen hundred dollar MSR P price range that we play. You know, it’s significantly down year over year.

[00:33:21] The true the true value is coming from the increases are coming from Smar and coming from watches that are above five thousand dollars. Really? So yeah, in the luxury market.

[00:33:32] So you you have to be so savvy and smar to manage your way through these big disruptions in the market as the consumer, the consumer’s tastes change, but also where they shop changes as as we know what the eCom Pure plays like Amazon, it’s you and me, it’s everybody. We’re shopping on Amazon and part of the time. Think about that. It’s just over 10 percent of total retail sales in the United States. They project that project. Going to be over 25 percent in a few years, which it sounds like while that’s still seems so low because I’m doing so much for my shopping online. But. In reality, it’s huge when you think about the footprint of brick and mortar retail.

[00:34:26] Yeah, absolutely. You know, we’ve been rate reading a little bit about Singles Day here, which took place here recently. And it is amazing how much traffic and how much it takes place in a 24 hour period. In fact, if you look at 2018 figures and I’ll have the final twenty nineteen singles there figures, but Singles Day in China with Ali Baba, just one company more than doubles all the U.S. e-commerce sales combined between Black Friday and Cyber Monday. That is that is is incredible. Incredible.

[00:35:05] And you can see that, too. I mean it here. If here a.

[00:35:10] A partner with Amazon. You sell your products on Amazon. You can see that when you do a W W a wow or a deal of the day or certainly when you do some promotion around Thanksgiving and holiday, you get huge lifts that it’s you just can’t get anywhere else. You know, it’s weird because now there are a lot of companies that started off as e-com companies like a Warby Parker, for example, with eyeglasses.

[00:35:44] And so it’s coming full circle. Those companies, as well as Amazon, by the way, who was opened up their second bookstore, I think there’s companies now just aiding those companies, like there’s a company called Brand Box. There’s a company called Made by Way, which is part of that. We work a company. There’s a company called Show Show Fields. What what they do is they say, oh, we’ll get you set up in a brick and mortar retail. We assume the long term lease obligations and we can get you we can help you sort your product, price your product. So they could do that, curating, if you will, and set up your space and you don’t have that long term lease obligation. Now, what you’re doing is growing your physical space organically because you don’t have a big, you know, 10 year lease to cover. That’s a complete 180, right from because we know that there are still brick and mortar stores closing and thousands and thousands of them will close again in the next five years, both in malls and in strips.

[00:36:59] Or what? So as we start to wind down the interview here, what is one more key take away from your time spent at the IBF event, but whether your own presentation. I bet you had some interesting Q&A to some of the networking, to some of the other other keynotes down there. What what else really stood out, Glenn?

[00:37:22] Yeah.

[00:37:24] I tip two things, one is that as as important as technology is, process and organizational structure are are even more critical because many of these people that are presenting and there were so many different. There was a medical sports sports where health care watch is Owens Corning.

[00:37:53] There were so many different companies that presented BASF, you know, chemical company. There was a Catalan.

[00:38:06] There are so many Leopold and Stevens and other Logitech customer that what you find out is that they’re the main hurdle and and change management in their organizations was aligning with the leadership, getting a buy in from the stakeholders to support a process, because you really need everyone in the organization to have input into the planning process because it’s usually mostly it’s the company’s biggest investment. Right. In their own inventory and their own plan. There’s really no other bigger budget. Marketing pales in comparison to what you will have to buy or manufacture that you ultimately sell. So you really need this all then approach. And so that emotional televisions and figuring out how to get it done is somewhat unique in every organization, but requires a lot of collaboration and finding the right partners to do that. In my case, it’s with the chief technology officer who has helped me a lot in making the case to do upgrades to our system in expansions of the solution to two other divisions, as well as the financial. You know, our CFO, who’s very much interested obviously in controlling what is happening and managing through what is a very difficult and disruptive time period in a market for for, you know, for any brand. So in addition to all the fun stuff about what a guy is helping us with, we have the same old task. But now it’s even more important, which is is enjoining others to our cause. And so many people spoke about, you know, planning being its own independent department because there’s it’s fraught with difficulties when it reports directly to sales or finance or it really needs to be quite an independent.

[00:40:25] Yes. Above the fray and and out of the riffraff. Right. Right. It really. But to your point, it needs to take in all the factors. Not one department and put in factors, right?

[00:40:40] That’s right. It’s so critical because you have to be aligned. We’re very embedded, our group with the sales organization. As difficult as that is sometimes because. Yeah, I mean, it really is. It’s challenging because every day the sales narrative I like to call it can change. So you have to be on your toes to make sure that you understand. That’s why we have a really close relationship with our sales group and our national accounts team. They’re they’re driving the business or mitigating that risk. And so if you’re not there at the table early enough, you can’t make the appropriate pivot in that plan. I also encourage people to be more financial in their thinking. You’re not just forecasting units. You’re forecasting an investment. Right. Forecasts what’s being used to buy, to purchase product, to resell, to sell to your consumer.

[00:41:46] So it’s it’s a critical financial, a huge financial obligation for the company to have this open a by budget. So you want to. You want to make sure you understand what the dollars are.

[00:42:00] You know, a lot of what that law, what you’re describing from all the different characteristics and traits that that make up really successful supply chain practitioners, you know, in 2019. It really reminds me of the evolving talent market is coming into the industry. You know, folks that are that can use data analytics and and more so than ever before, folks have a sense of the financial side of things. Big picture thinkers, you know, folks that can understand across and then supply chain how one decision made upstream can really bullwhip out downstream and then understand how things are interconnected there. These are really not that none of those traits have existed in previous generations and supply chain. But more so than ever before, those traits and others are really in demand, no pun intended in supply chain these days, right?

[00:43:05] Glen Yeah. I mean, I have to agree that that’s a good observation. Scott got the that the new crop. First of all, I went to the Gartner conference. There’s so much focus now in this area of the organization and there’s so much new smart young talent coming in. This is not the analysts of 20 years ago. And this is these are certainly not back-room people. These are people at the cutting edge, two of their organizations. And mainly that’s being driven by, as I said, technology. And and this this is just the amount of money involved it requires that you get that is part of the organization be very well developed. We listened to a gentleman from premier, one of the biggest retailers, Target. It’s just phenomenal what Target has done in three years. And some other organizations are doing catch up. You know, Kohl’s and Target have done a lot to improve their supply chains to to re act, to become very omni channel, meaning, you know, I could pick it up anywhere, return in anywhere. I can pick it up in store. I could order it online. It’s it’s creating this frictionless environment that the consumer is demanding that if the retailers, the retailers that are getting that right are really going to benefit from it. I know, I know. Target is sure down the line. And it’s just the same case for brands. I mean, you think about her. When I told the people at the conference that we had five, six monthly times, every eyebrow was raised like, well, how do you manage that? You know, it’s such a frozen period.

[00:45:11] How do you manage? I say what you have to. You have to be. It’s not easy, A, but B, you have to be very tuned in with sales trends. Mm hmm. Crust a leading indicator of new models is often going to be the only thing you have to make a decision as to whether or not to to make a bigger investment in that model before you have all of the supporting details.

[00:45:36] Mm hmm. Great point. Excellent point. Well, Glenn, I want to make sure that our listeners know how they can learn more about Citizens Watch of America and or get in touch with you.

[00:45:50] Yeah, absolutely. I know. I love to mentor in my. I have a LinkedIn profile, so just look me up on LinkedIn. Yeah. Glenn Pascrell P.A.s C R E L. Our first name has two ends. You can I also have a G-mail. They can they can always write my G-mail. It’s PHC R E L G at G-mail dot com. So is my last L is left off. Replace my first initial. Mm hmm.

[00:46:21] And those are probably the best ways to reach out to me or if they had the good fortune of catching when you’re keynotes at an upcoming event. As much as we’ve enjoyed that. So really appreciate you carving out some time to join us again here. Glenn Pascrell, Senior Vise President, Merchandise Planning and Market Analytics, Citizen Watch America. Glenn, hope to reconnect here, wrote a general soon.

[00:46:48] Thank you. Scott was great talking to you again.

[00:46:49] You bet. Hope you have a wonderful into the years. Hard to believer in mid-November. almo- almost turkey day. Glenn Oh, my. All right. So to our audience, as we wrap up this episode, we want to mention a couple things to you. First off, come check out in person. We love to connect with our listeners. We’re going to a wide variety of events over the next four, five, six months or so, beginning with the CSC MP Atlanta roundtable in January. They’re welcoming a NASCAR track staff member to Atlanta to talk about some of the regulations in the world of transportation and what it means for you. You can learn more at Atlanta, CSC MP dot org. Next up, in February, we’re gonna be joining the reverse Logistics Association for their conference next boat out in Las Vegas in February 2020. Great event. Outstanding event, really in a ever in an aspect of supply chain that’s growing hourly. And it’s important you can learn more about that organization and their big event at R L A dot org for reverse Logistics. SCAC. And then one final note. mutex. Twenty twenty one. The largest supply chain trade shows in all of North America coming back to Atlanta in March, the week of March 9th and we’ll be broadcasting throughout four days of this show and to our audience.

[00:48:12] It’s free to attend. You can go to Moad X show dot com to sign up for this this huge event. And secondly, about mutex 2020. They have graciously agreed to host our 2020 Atlanta Supply chain Awards, which will be year 2 for that program. We’re going to be featuring Christian Fisher, president and CEO Georgia-Pacific as our keynote. More about it. We’re excited about that. Glenn, if you can’t tell Nomination’s registrations and sponsorships are all open for Vetlanta Supply chain Awards, you can learn more at Atlanta Supply chain Awards com. Big thanks to our featured guest today here on Supply Chain Now Radio. A repeat guest no less. Glenn Pascrell, Senior Vise President, Merchandise Planning and Market Analytics with Citizen Watch America. Also that the pride of Patterson, New Jersey. Maybe Glynn’s family is proud of Patterson, New Jersey. But Glenn, always a pleasure. To our audience, be sure to check out other upcoming events, replays over interviews, other resources at Supply Chain Now Radio dot com. Find us wherever you get your podcast from. Subscribe so you aren’t missing thing on behalf of the entire Supply Chain Now Radio team. This is Scott Luton. Wish you a wonderful week ahead and we’ll see you next time. Owen Supply Chain Now Radio thanks everybody.