The Best One Yet - Match launches date coaching, Ralph Lauren’s Gen-Z moves, and Walmart’s 1-day free shipping reveal

Episode Date: May 15, 2019

Ralph Lauren shares dropped even though its latest marketing moves are winning Gen Z. Dating app icon Match announced a new coaching hotline to get you to date #2. And the “Free Shipping Wars” of Walmart vs. Amazon were just kicked up a couple notches.Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is Nick. This is Jack. This is Snack. Daily, it's Wednesday. 8.15th. This is the best one yet. It really is. I mean, yesterday's was pretty good, Jeff.

Now, markets rose today based on a tweet, basically. That's what's happening. You've heard of supply and demand. It's not profit growth. Nope. Not innovation. Not fundamental economics. President Trump tweeted yesterday morning that maybe he would get a trade deal done.

And exactly what he wanted to happen? Happened. Markets' Jones. But Snack style, we went in and found a wonderful mix of stories for you guys. First one is Ralph Lauren. It's making a big Gen Z. push and it's paying off, but the stock dropped by 6%. And we have some doubts about the like gen Zee-iness of this whole situation.

I'm very skeptical. Very. Second story is Walmart versus Amazon. Goliath versus Goliath. The big battle just kicked up a notch in one day shipping. The real takeaway here, Adam Smith's wonderful invisible hand of competition. Econ 101. Third and final story is Match Group.

It just launched a human dating support line for people using the app. Very nice. Very nice. Sometimes you need a little help getting to date. date number two. My question, isn't this what friends are for, consulting on your app dating game? But before we start helping your dating game, we got to start talking about

your busy game. Yeah, this could be a new innovation in hotels. We're talking about the new TWA terminal that's being launched at JFK's airport in New York. It's the TWA hotel actually. It's based at Terminal 5 at JFK. You've probably seen it. It kind of looks like a Flintstones vibe meets like a Jetsons vibe. It made a great

cameo in that Leo DiCaprio movie. Catch me if you can't. Very nice kind of 60 style. So they're revamping this old amazing architecture. Jet Ballou contributed. They paid like millions of dollars to do this. Yeah, it's a big project that's going to open soon and get this. Here is the thing we're fascinated with. The hotel manager announced yesterday that he aims for 200%

occupancy at this hotel. And we know what you're thinking. 100% is pretty much the maximum occupancy. Nope. He wants double booking. So we don't know if that means you're sleeping head to toe. You're bunking up with strangers. You probably don't want to be in either situation. The bed bugs, the germs, the other stuff. Here's the

deal. This is based at JFK Air A lot of people have layovers. A lot of people just need the hotel for like seven or eight hours. Just want some Wi-Fi, a massage, and a cool glass of water. The TWA Hotel is trying to flip over each room twice within one day. Boom, we're talking like pit crew style getting in there. We got to give all the credit not to management, but to the cleaning staff. Oh my God.

They're going to have to do a real quick turnaround. Like even faster than airplanes do quick turnaround. We're talking white sheets that may be pressed. I don't know. May we recommend that this staff after like a couple years at TWA Hotel go. go to NASCAR. The pit crew could use you. Leave a tip for these guys. They're going to be doing an incredible job. They're going to hit that 200%. Now, before we get to those stories, check out some important words. You're tuned in the snacks daily. We spoke to the lawyers and we got to get something legal out the way. It's snacks about to hear ain't food. It's air candy. They don't reflect the views of the robberhood family. It's all informational just so.

We're not recommending any securities. It's not a research report or investment advice. Not an offer or sale of a security. Snacks is digestible Business news for you Robberhood Financial LLC Member Fenra Slash SIPC For our first story

Jack pop your plaid collar over there Ralph Lauren had a big quarter thanks to Gen Z And then the stock dropped 6%. Yeah, Gen Z so relatable to Polo Playing croquet on horseback Yeah, mid Snapchat over there

Now 50th anniversary for Ralph Right? Yeah And it's Ralph Lauren Not Ralph Laurent He's American, he's not French And he makes it very clear. So profits beat expectations last quarter. And then revenue growth was better than they expected.

It grew for the first time in a while. And that's a big accomplishment because revenues are still below their 2014 peak for Ralph. And then e-commerce-wise, digital sales jumped like 11%. And then if you actually own shares of Ralph Lauren, you are pumped because they raised the dividend, which is the cash check you get every three months by 10%. It's like a buy one polo get one free situation except with shares. So we're going to focus on their increased marketing. spend, which they're dubbing the next great chapter plan. Now, that's literally what they call it.

We jumped into the numbers and we noticed that marketing spending was up 13% for Ralph and team. By the way, Ralph's not there anymore. They got a new CEO. He's like just relaxing. Yeah. So they're targeting Gen Z now. And that's probably because the company has research that shows that their average user is like 85 years old and getting a little too old. And maybe prefers like the smaller, not the bigger polo pony. Right. So they're going after Gen Z. And naturally, the first place they turn is social media influencers. Okay, so when it comes to social media influencers, they're not just going with their usual ones. They want influencers who, like, don't know what Y2K is.

They went with Taylor Hill, who we had to Google. She's one of the youngest Victoria's Secret models. I think she's born in 96 or 97. Same birthday as me. Very nice, but young enough to maybe be Jack's offspring. She's very, very Gen Z. Now, then they say the values are like the next Gen Z-ish thing that Ralph Lauren's focusing. The company has this new ad campaign called Family is World.

who you love. And it's just a bunch of TV ads that are vaguely more diverse and progressive than old school polo ads. Very relative. I mean, they've got like seven couples they're highlighting here. One of them happens to be same-sex couple instead of zero. It is slightly less country club than old school polo ads, but still all the actors in the ads, very, very gorgeous. I'm pretty sure you can see one of the guys' abs is like tearing through the shirt. All right. So we got social media influencers. We have family values. Can we talk about this third one? Because this one I think may be the most exciting. The drop.

I want to talk about the drop. Tell me about the drop. Okay, so here's how the drop works. It's when Ralph Lauren did a collaboration with a company in London to do like streetwear clothes. Yeah. How did they get this out there? Did they promote it on social media? Yeah, they did a little promotion on social media.

But that's like, Jack, that's like, who doesn't promote on social media? I'm guessing I sent some exclusivity coming on here. Exactly. I like where your words are leading. You can only get those items if you download the Ralph Lauren app. So basically, if you're my mom, you're not buying the stuff. polo shirt because still dealing with like the iPhone situation and how that works. If you're rocking your iPhone X10S.

Boom. You've downloaded the app and you're the only person who's getting these new polo shirts. So Jack, what's the takeaway for our buddies over at Ralph? Not all sales are equal. So true. The stock dropped, everyone. This stock dropped 6%. So annoying.

We saw the headline numbers. They looked very good. But then Wall Street doesn't care at all. So we looked into it and we figured out why. There was really one number they cared about. It was the 7% drop in sales in North America. North America is the home market. We told you Ralph Lauren is American and 7% drop in North America. So even though sales are growing big overseas, investors really focused on one market.

Investors expected sales to grow high overseas. They didn't expect sales to drop in North America. And the U.S. is held to a higher standard. It's a sign that investors sometimes care about one statistic more than another, even if they seem related. For our second story, Walmart versus Amazon. The shipping wars were just escalated like a couple notches. Amazon, get out of my way. Walmart made it. statement this week. Over an aisle three. Get this free.

One day shipping on 220,000 items as long as it's $35. Yeah, a small asterisk there. He just got it's been more than $35. But unlike Amazon Prime, this free shipping for Walmart, it's free to everybody. There's no like Prime Club you got to join. No $150 a year. You know, if they hit up somebody who's still a student to get a student discount, boom, you're already enrolled in Walmart.

No password sharing either. And this is actually like the first time we've seen Amazon truly get trumped in something. Right, because Walmart's free shipping. Can't say that it has the best price now. It can't say it anymore. Walmart has the best free shipping there is. So basically Walmart's saying, you know, we're going to start out in Vegas and Phoenix with this. Why does Phoenix get all the pilot projects? They get the self-driving cars. They got the dry heat and they've got great golf. But they seem to get the best of like a lot of things going on right now. So it's just in Phoenix and Vegas right now. But by the end of next year,

75% of the U.S. population will get free one-day shipping from Walmart. Okay, well then you're like, you know what? Tushay Walmart. What does Amazon want to do to kick things up a notch? Well, Amazon is different because it wants to own the entire shipping process and not outsource it to FedEx or UPS. That's a key distinction. Sometimes you hear that referred to as like vertically integrated. A company wants to own every part of the process before a product gets to you.

Here's another part of the process that Amazon wants to own. It has 50 shipping like cargo airplanes. We're talking really big. They got a little Amazon logo on them and they're only dropping off Amazon stuff. Number two. Last year, they launched this small entrepreneurial run shipping initiative, which was called Delivery Service Partners. Right. It's kind of like, I don't know, like a feel-good corporate social responsibility thing slash incubator for future startups.

Basically, they don't want to give all their packages to FedEx, UPS, and the Postal Service. So they have these, like, local entrepreneurs who will handle my hometown of Brattleboro, Vermont by just like renting out a van and delivering the packages. So now they're kicking up delivery service partnerships. another notch. They're going to offer you $10,000 if you'll quit your job at Amazon. Sounds like a price is right one. And they'll pay you three months of your old Amazon pay if you'll become a delivery service partner. You just got to sign here, do a couple things, fill out a couple forms. And then deliver a ton of heavy packages as an Amazon delivery. So basically you're quitting Amazon as an employee, but you're running your own kind of mini logistics

company that Amazon is subsidizing. It shows how serious Amazon is about shipping. So, Jack, what's the takeaway for our buddies over in? Can we call it like the shipping wars? The free shipping wars. I like the sound of that. Competition is a beautiful thing. Our lives are cheaper. They're more convenient, basically because of e-commerce in so many ways.

Amazon has improved our lives in a lot of ways. But if it wasn't for Walmart existing, Amazon probably would have got comfortable by now. It never would have rolled out one day shipping, and it probably would have jacked up the price of Amazon price. So no matter what you think of these companies, it's really the relationship between the two, which is absolute insanely intense competition. Yeah. That's what makes this such a good thing. The winner of this Goliath versus Goliath free shipping war is consumers like you and me. And competition is all about customer love in the end.

For our third and final story, this is a wild one, match the dating app, just launched a premium dating coaching feature for all its app users. This is modern dating, Nick. This is big. Modern dating is done on apps. And that's great if you're a group of the phone. If you're hashtag fluent. But if you're GenX or a baby boomer, you are struggling in this. App Dating game.

You're calling up like your younger cousin from like your niece from Thanksgiving. You're like, hey, hey, by the way. I mean, what is some stuff you're dealing with there? You know, he ghosted me. Should I reengage? Or hashtags in or hashtags out that I use the right hashtag button. What is a hashtag button? She asked me if I was Gucci.

What does that mean? I just typed, can't wait. Now I sound like a loser. Why did I do two exclamation points? I can't believe that. Three is the maximum. Well, there is finally a solution. It's called Ask Match.

Now, this is the coaching hotline for like struggling data. out there who are just trying to use Match. It's only available to paid users on the Match app. By the way, Match is owned by Match Group, which is a publicly traded company. True, and they own, like, Tinder and pretty much any dating app. 20 other dating apps. Now, the key feature that they're kind of promoting with this thing is pickup line workshop.

We're talking about, like, the worst stuff that you could throw out there trying to, like, you know, hey, what brought you in here? This is hilarious. If you want to, like, vicariously experience some trash, sign up to be a match dating coach because this is good stuff. Now, in case you weren't sure what this means in terms of statistics, here's a non-shocking answer. Men were three times

as likely as women to try this out in the baited testing that's happened so far. Basically, this whole situation would render the entire sex in the city franchise implausible. Can you imagine if the show ended with Samantha dumping Carrie because she doesn't need dating advice anymore? Why would you even talk to your friends

about who's dating whom when you can go right to your Tinder app, you know, right to your match app, and literally call up a coach, which is just any employee at match group can sign up to be a coach. I would love to see the resume situation going on here. No certifications, no qualifications. If you work at match, you can be a dating coach. You just need to have seen a few rom-coms, it sounds like, and maybe have a pulse. So a big reason why this is working, people are willing to spend money to find true love. It's so true. You spend a lot of money trying to find Mr. or Mrs. Wright. You buy nice clothing.

Very nice. You pay for drinks, as everyone should do. You might take her out to a lobster, dinner. What do you? Like a 19th century oil tycoon? My wife's my first meal was Shake Shaq. Okay, good for you. Mine was at Beer Fest and you know that. But people are wasting tons of money and if you don't find your one and only, you're willing to invest to improve your odds. Now, the reason why Match knows it can take advantage of this situation is it has the pricing power. Because people want true love. So Jack, what's the takeaway for our buddies over at Match? Testing, testing, testing. This feature is starting in New York City first. It's not even going nationwide until 2020. And it's only on Match, not Tinder, not Hinge, or the 20 other apps that

Match Group owns. So this reflects a really key theme we've noticed in tech. When you try out a new feature, just try it out on a tiny little bit of the customer base. And then maybe do some PR to get some more credibility. See if it works. Get the data. Tweek it, make it better, and then scale it everywhere in the world. Only when it's perfect. Jack, can you whip up the takeaways for us? Ralph Lauren's Operation Gen Z is working, but investors were upset about dropping American sales. Not all sales are equal. And then Walmart is offering free one day shipping, and we're just thankful that Walmart and Amazon are fighting each other. The more they fight, the more love we're feeling over here. Seriously. Sit back and take it. Match just rolled out.

It's coaching hotline for struggling daters. Tech is in love with one thing. Testing, testing, testing, testing, testing, testing. Testing, testing. Now, time for our snack fact of the day. Jack, can you launch this one? There's a new gold rush, and it's an outer space. Very nice place, beautiful views. Space mining companies are gearing up fly into orbit and collect precious metals from planets, from the Milky Way, from the stars. You know the rule. The harder it is to get this thing, the fancier it's going to look when it's on you. Now, activists want to limit space mining. Now, this is the key number. This is the key stat, the level of limitation. To just 15% of the solar system. So 85% of the solar system should be protected as space wilderness.

Now, we know what you're thinking. Isn't the solar system expanding infinitely at like a ridiculously fast speed? Yes. But this number is pretty fast. You know what else you're thinking. Doesn't this sound like the movie Avatar? Yes. Okay, a couple other big stories yesterday. Check out our daily newsletter. You can sign up at Snacks.robinhood.com. First, Bayer, the German drug company, got sued for $2 billion because its Roundup weed killer allegedly causes cancer. And then Spotify continued to launch new features. This one fascinating, a way to follow your favorite artists with stories. Snackers, if you want to become quasi-famous on the Snacks Daily podcast, we love making people

Send in a snack fact of the day at Robin Hood Snacks on Twitter. We want to know your hometown. We want to know your facts. And we want to get you a shot. Now, we will be there for you tomorrow morning. We always are. Can't wait. Great.

The Robin Hood Snacks podcast you just heard reflects the opinions of only the hosts who are associated persons of Robin Hood Financial LLC and does not reflect the views of Robin Hood Markets, or any of its subsidiaries or affiliates. The podcast is for informational purposes only and is not intended to serve as a recommendation to buy or sell any security and is not an offer or sale of a security. The podcast is also not a research report and is not intended to serve as the basis of any investment decision. Robin Hood Financial LLC, member FINRA, SIPC.