Who Attended Retail Fest? Global Brands, Success Stories & More from Retail Fest 2024

With the next lineup of speakers of Retail Fest 2025 coming out soon, here’s a throwback of the esteemed speakers who graced the occasion with their thoughts and insights on Retail Fest 2024.

Let’s explore the brands that stole the show, all the industries participating on the keynote panel, and their stature – followed up by a full speaker list.

We Had Global Brands Spill Their Success Stories

As a retail conference for enterprise businesses, Retail Fest was a concoction of leading brands coming together on the pedestal. From leading e-commerce platforms like Maropost, leading in international operations, to prominent household Australian retailers like BIG W, there was so much to learn from their million-mile success journey.

A common aspect across all global brands their keynotes, was the astute nature of a problem-solving approach. From growth marketing enthusiasts to co-founders and CEOs, there was no shying away from putting the solutions to their adversities on the table. 

It’s very easy to say that big brands have it easy due to a massive war chest in people and paper money, but this groundbreaking scenario favours none when it comes to challenges that it brings forth. Every speaker emphasised the importance of overcoming challenges with a plan of action that involved thinking backwards.

Some of the key speakers were leaders in beauty and apparel. We are talking about Spotlight Retail Group, a global leader in homeware and crafts, Mecca Brands and its beauty range, and brands like Boody, which specialise in sustainable clothing.

A global success story that inspired many was one of The Proud Poppy, scaling from $300,000 to $21 million in just three years. It’s safe to say that this was the perfect retail conference for startups, with major players in the international retail landscape sharing their two cents.

One Conference for All Industries

Retail Fest 2024 by Retail Global went beyond being just another conference for a limited amount of stakeholders. When the scale of the audience is massive, and everyone aspires to be part of a proactive ecosystem, this is where they get what they want — be it an immersive networking platform or one-on-one insights via industry leaders. Here’s an overview of all the industries that our keynote speakers catered to in the conference.

Fashion & Apparel

Speakers shared their insights on forward-first ecosystems for fashion, making it the perfect retail conference for new businesses. 

Featured brands: Culture Kings, Outland Denim, Proud Poppy Clothing, Azura Fashion Group, The Laundry Lady, and Vivra.

Beauty & Personal Care

The hottest industry on the rise due to new-age consumerism practices, keynote speakers from the beauty niche talked about actionable objectives that brands must adapt to scale up in the future.

Featured brands: Oz Hair & Beauty, Naked Harvest Supplements, and FRANKIE4.

E-Commerce & Digital Retail

The quickest evolving industry niche required the finest players to speak up on their operational scales and manage digital ecosystems, ranging from customer service to delivery.

Feature brands: Zellis, BigCommerce, Lucent Globe, Dash Hudson, and Searchspring.

Home & Lifestyle

As one of the high-volume, high-cost moving products in the retail chain, this industry had keynote speakers from up-and-coming brands and experienced brands. They shared their insights on how they moved ahead of adversities in due time and effort.

Featured brands: Snuggle Honey Kids, Flora & Fauna, ECO. Modern Essentials, and Leisure-Tec Group.

Sustainability & Nature-First

From food and beverage brands to sustainable causes, speakers highlighted how to be good and do good while preaching sustainability as a practice.

Featured brands: Circonomy, Sustainable Choice Group, Salvos Stores, Naked Wines, Go Bare, and The BBQ Store.

A Special Chance to Tête-à-Tête

Unlike other retail conferences for large conferences that involve simply nothing but a callosum-esque showcase of their industry keynote speakers, Retail Fest 2024 was truly straight to the point. Every member of the audience had a chance to go head-to-head with industry veterans through the RF-hosted access. 

A one-on-one interaction where they could share their problems with retail gurus and actually get their two cents and more enabled a huge shift from the quintessential retail conference networking format.

Considering that there were so many prominent personalities on the keynote speaker board, this was a golden ticket to success for many. From Simon Beard’s million-dollar success tips on his journey with Culture Kings to the opportunities of hiring the next best talent, this was the perfect retail conference for startups and enterprise businesses alike.