As the co-founder and CEO of SUMO Heavy Industries, a boutique digital commerce consultancy, Bart Mroz focuses on helping clients’ digital teams become more successful. He takes his coffee black.
In this episode, we discuss:
Bart’s 20-plus years in the commerce industry and the founding of SUMO Heavy
SUMO Heavy's focus on emerging sellers (up to $25M annual revenues) and the enterprise space ($100M+) and the company’s intentionally limited number of clients
How SUMO Heavy assesses what new clients need and roadmaps the work to come
The current commerce environment and what retailers and brands need to compete and succeed (hint: it’s the consumer experience)
The value and dangers of the overall transparency demanded by consumers today
How the ecommerce platform space has evolved over the years, and how to think about current offerings (e.g. Shopify, Big Commerce, Workarea Commerce)
The push towards microservices and why Bart expects even more commerce software options to hit the market in the next two years
Whether retailers are moving more into “optimization mode” versus just implementing new, shiny solutions to solve their problems
Why 2019 will be the year when retailers step back and find ways to work more efficiently and make ecommerce work better for the business – while some new commerce plays/models will come to market in the next wave of DNVB (digitally native vertical brand) innovation