The Retailgentic “Start Here” Playlist
Five Essential Episodes to Catch Up On Over the Holidays
As we wrap up the year, a lot of you have been asking the same question:
“Where should I start if I want to really understand Agentic Commerce?”
It’s a fair question. With AI shoppers, consolidated loyalty, agentic discovery, collapsing funnels, rewired attribution, and new checkout layers all accelerating at once, it can be hard to know where to begin.
So before we head into the holiday season, we’ve curated something special:
The Retailgentic Start Here Playlist: five foundational conversations to get you fully grounded before 2025.
Whether you’re a retailer, founder, operator, investor, analyst, or simply AI-curious, these episodes offer the clearest, most future-forward explanations of what’s happening right now, and what’s coming next.
Pour some hot cocoa, settle in over the break, and start the new year with a rock-solid foundation.
Ronnie Chatterji: How People Actually Use ChatGPT (and what early agentic behavior looks like)
This is one of our most important conversations for understanding real consumer behavior. Ronnie breaks down how millions of people use ChatGPT today, for search, tasks, planning, research, and early forms of agentic shopping.
We explore:
Why the first wave of agents is already here
Emerging shopping behaviors the data is revealing
How AI “helper modes” evolve into full agents
What brands should do now to become machine-readable
If you want to understand how the consumer brain is changing, start here.
🎧 Listen wherever you get your podcasts: Spotify, Apple, etc.
Or, we have a video version on YouTube (make sure to subscribe!) →
Caila Schwartz: Agentic Discovery, Loyalty Shifts & “Discount Chicken”
Salesforce’s Caila Schwartz brings the receipts: data on AI-influenced sales, channel shifts, loyalty consolidation, and the TikTok-ification of discovery.
Highlights include:
Why 21% of global holiday spend will be influenced by AI
Discovery > discounts as the new seasonal theme
The “Tuesday after Cyber Monday” surprise trend
Gen Z bringing back the mall — but with agents
Why Baby Boomers quietly became an AI shopping segment
The return of Discount Chicken
If you want a data-driven look at how AI shoppers are reshaping retail right now, this one is essential.
🎧 Listen wherever you get your podcasts: Spotify, Apple, etc.
Or, we have a video version on YouTube (make sure to subscribe!) →
Kiri Masters: How Retail Media Really Works
Kiri Masters breaks down the economics behind retail media in a way most people never hear:
Onsite, offsite, and trade spend… who makes money and why
Walmart vs. Amazon: two diverging strategies for AI agents
Why loyalty programs may be the last real moat
How agents could disrupt traffic, attribution, and conversion flows
What RMNs fear most in an agentic era
If you’re trying to understand how ad budgets, discovery, and loyalty move when the shopper is an AI, start here.
🎧 Listen wherever you get your podcasts: Spotify, Apple, etc.
Or, we have a video version on YouTube (make sure to subscribe!) →
Andrea Leigh: AI Shopping & the Collapse of the Funnel
Andrea’s AIR report is one of the clearest reads on how AI is rewriting the buyer journey.
We discuss:
~60% of shoppers using AI for product research
TikTok as Gen Z’s default search engine
“Value” as both price and purpose
The rising power of resale and circular channels
Social commerce’s explosive growth
Why D2C sites matter more than ever in an AI-first world
Retail media & SEO under pressure from LLMs
If you want to understand the strategic implications of agentic commerce for brands, this episode is the roadmap.
🎧 Listen wherever you get your podcasts: Spotify, Apple, etc.
Or, we have a video version on YouTube (make sure to subscribe!) →
Alex Rampell: Identity, Wallets & Why Agents Will Transform Checkout
A masterclass in how commerce, payments, and AI converge.
Alex unpacks:
Whether Google is actually screwed
How attribution is being rewired
Lessons from TrialPay, Affirm, affiliates, and fintech
Why ChatGPT could become a checkout destination
What happens when optimization, not search, becomes the battleground
Why agents negotiating on your behalf changes everything
If you care about identity, payments, or platform power, this episode will absolutely reframe how you see the next decade.
🎧 Listen wherever you get your podcasts: Spotify, Apple, etc.
Or, we have a video version on YouTube (make sure to subscribe!) →
Why These Five?
Together, these conversations cover the full stack of the agentic commerce transformation:
Consumer behavior (Chatterji)
Retail & seasonal data (Schwartz)
Media & ad economics (Masters)
Brand & shopper strategy (Leigh)
Identity, payments, and infrastructure (Rampell)
They’re the five lenses you must understand to see the whole picture.
🎄 Your Holiday Assignment (Optional… but recommended)
If you want to stay ahead in 2026:
📌 Listen to these five episodes over the break.
📌 Share them with a colleague or your team.
📌 Come back in January ready to talk about agentic commerce with confidence.
Whether you’re tuning in from the airport, the couch, or a long drive home: thank you for being part of this community. Retail is changing fast, and it’s more fun to decode it together.
Happy Holidays from Retailgentic!