Shekar Natarajan is using the specialty retailer as a base to Uberize the supply chain with a sharing mentality.
American Eagle paid $350 million in cash for Quiet, describing the deal as “the next step” in its “supply chain transformation.” Quiet uses “state-of-the-art technology and robotics” and “a network of modern centers, currently operating in Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles, Dallas, St. Louis and Jacksonville” to move goods closer to consumers.
“If you project the world into the future, what happens with e-commerce growth and the need for labor and capacity, it’s just taking off in a direction you cannot control,” he said. “The best way to bring back influence and control to the market is by creating that sharing mentality.” “You cannot have big retail and very small retail, you need to have mid retail,” he said. “That’s how the diversity of the system is maintained and restored.”“Everyone in the network is understanding that they are not the ecosystem, they are part of the ecosystem,” he said.