Pacsun CEO Brieane Olson on Gen Z, TikTok Commerce & the Future of Retail Innovation | WRC 2025
Broadcasting from the VusionGroup booth at the World Retail Congress, Chris Walton and Anne Mezzenga sit down with Pacsun CEO Brieane Olson for a candid and energizing conversation on youth culture, experimentation, and the future of fashion retail. Brieane reflects on how her two-decade Pacsun journey has prepared her to lead in a time of rapid digital evolution. From rebooting Roblox efforts to tracking the creator economy and prioritizing social commerce on TikTok and YouTube, Brieane shares what it takes to build relevance with Gen Z and lead with curiosity in every corner of the business.
Key Moments:
- (0:35) Brieane Olson background and Pacsun growth
- (1:00) U.S. footprint: 75 new stores in 3 years
- (1:30) Early innovation with Roblox and the metaverse
- (2:40) How Pacsun picks and pivots on tech pilots
- (4:00) Fail fast, retool, relaunch: Roblox case study
- (5:00) Building a culture of innovation and curiosity
- (6:30) CEO routines for staying on trend (Substack, Reddit, Discord)
- (7:40) First-time impressions of World Retail Congress
- (8:50) Holiday 2025 outlook and global expansion plans
- (9:30) Platforms to watch: TikTok, YouTube Shopping, Substack
- (10:30) Mall resurgence and community building in youth retail
#BrieaneOlson #pacsun #retailinnovation #GenZRetail #socialcommerce #tiktokshopping #worldretailcongress #retailleadership #creatoreconomy #retailtech #robloxfashion #omnitalk #failfast #retailexpansion #youthculture
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Transcript
Welcome back everyone.
Speaker A:This is Amitakh Retail live from World Retail Congress in London.
Speaker A:I'm Anne Mazinga.
Speaker B:And I'm Chris Walton.
Speaker A:And we are coming to you live from the Fusion Group booth.
Speaker A:I want to give them a big thank you for making all of our coverage of World Retail Congress possible today.
Speaker A:And standing next to us, Chris, today we have the CEO of PacSun, Brianne Olson.
Speaker A:Brianne, welcome.
Speaker A:Thank you so much for making time for us today.
Speaker C:Of course.
Speaker C:Thank you for having me.
Speaker B:So, Brianne, I'm curious.
Speaker B:So tell us a little bit about your background for the audience.
Speaker B:And because this is a global conference too, why don't you explain a little bit about pacsun as well?
Speaker C:Of course, I'd love to.
Speaker C:I've been at PacSun just about two decades now.
Speaker B:Two decades?
Speaker C:Wow.
Speaker C:PacSun is a youth oriented retailer and apparel retailer in the United States.
Speaker C:We operate about 350 stores in the US and are opening at a fast clip, 75 additional stores in the US over the next three years.
Speaker B:Oh, wow.
Speaker C:I've been in the fashion industry for just over 35 years.
Speaker B:Oh my God.
Speaker C:Wow.
Speaker A:What'd you do before PacSun?
Speaker C:I worked at Abercrombie and before that I worked in Italy for a luxury apparel group called Marzotto that had Gianfranco, Ferre and Valentino.
Speaker A:Oh my gosh.
Speaker A:Wow.
Speaker A:You've covered all of the areas of fashion in your life.
Speaker C:It's been a lot of fun.
Speaker A:I bet.
Speaker A:Well, Brianne, one of the things that I love so much about the work that you've done and the work that pacs on has done is that you're always the early adopters.
Speaker A:If there's a test to be done, you are the first ones to go do it.
Speaker A:I think of like your work with Roblox early on, testing in the Metaverse early on.
Speaker A:Like you, you're always game for a challenge and for a test.
Speaker A:But one question that I have is how do you decide which tests are the right tests to do and where you're going to invest?
Speaker A:And then also once you are in a test, how do you decide when it's time to pull back or how do you kind of end that?
Speaker A:What's your philosophy overall?
Speaker C:So our brand is really centered on innovation and we're consumer led and so we do tend to meet the consumer where they are.
Speaker C: So in the case of Roblox in: Speaker C:And we've built a lot of trust with our private equity teams and internal trust that we're in constant exploitation exploration all the time.
Speaker C:And in exploring and staying on the pulse of culture, it's really important to keep moving forward and to allow teams to navigate these spaces.
Speaker A:So how does that work?
Speaker A:Kind of behind the scenes, like does somebody come up on the team and they say, okay, we have this opportunity to do something in the metaverse.
Speaker A:I have to imagine there's a culture of innovation at Paxon where people are putting that into motion quickly.
Speaker A:Is that the case?
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker C:Ideas can come from anywhere and anything.
Speaker C:They usually come percolating from our audiences, our consumers.
Speaker C:They come from our brand ambassadors, who are the folks on the front line in our stores.
Speaker C:They come from so many different venues.
Speaker C:And I think the most important thing is to have an open mind, to have a constant curiosity and to push forward on innovation on all fronts and allow for exploration.
Speaker C:Which also means failing fast and learning quickly.
Speaker C:And then also when you fail and something doesn't succeed, it doesn't mean that it necessarily is time to abandon the platform.
Speaker C:Sometimes you have to retool.
Speaker C:So Roblox, for example, the first time that we launched, it was not a successful Launch.
Speaker C:We had 10,000 users.
Speaker C:Then Flash forward, we took all of those learnings, we spent more time with the consumers, and we had an incredibly successful, successful launch.
Speaker A:So it's about gathering information and reworking the plan or reworking the pilot with each of these things pretty quickly and then trying it again or moving on and trying something new.
Speaker C:Yeah, and all of these platforms are constantly evolving.
Speaker C:Like TikTok platform for shopping, for example.
Speaker C:It's in constant evolution, it's in a constant state of flux and, and change.
Speaker C:And so you can't stick with just one strategy.
Speaker C:It's a constant push forward of exploration.
Speaker A:Right?
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:Brian, you said something that stuck out to me.
Speaker B:I think you said the phrase be curious.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker B:And you know, I can think back to my career, particularly at Target.
Speaker B:One of the things I saw that started to separate the leaders from those that really got where things are going from those that don't were the ones that were curious and stayed atop of the latest trends.
Speaker B:What routines or practices do you employ as the CEO to stay on top and to continually be curious as things are changing, particularly with AI and everything else coming about.
Speaker B:How do you do that?
Speaker B:What advice do you have?
Speaker C:First, I spend a lot of time in our stores And I spend a lot of time across all of our platforms.
Speaker C:But more importantly, it's an internal team that has this incredible culture platform and they're on the pulse of what's next.
Speaker C:And you know, we have listening sessions, we have quarterly think tanks where people from all different areas of the organization come in and share their most innovative ideas, what they're thinking about that really can reach cross section.
Speaker C:And those are the moments and the ways that we stay interconnected.
Speaker A:Do you have some kind of like process or anything that you do to get, gather all that information?
Speaker A:I mean, I'm just thinking about like.
Speaker B:Like, like what apps you have on your phone.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:Are you scrolling?
Speaker A:We're taking notes.
Speaker B:Hear new things, like, oh, you know, in those think tank sessions, like, how do you, how do you incorporate that to understand it, you know, throughout the course of your daily life too?
Speaker B:I'm curious.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker C:So I think during the pandemic was a real opportunity for a reset.
Speaker C: when we launched on TikTok in: Speaker C:And I think it's really difficult to manage or guide or lead a team if you are not involved on the platforms, if you're not spending time in the spaces.
Speaker C:And so our consumer is succeeding.
Speaker C:Absolutely.
Speaker C:To build community, to be present in those communities, be watching how they evolve.
Speaker C:Whether you're looking at information that's happening on Discord or Reddit or substack and where people are sharing information, the great news about this generation is they are very open to sharing.
Speaker C:And so I look at it as a conduit and a real way to stay hyper involved.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker C:And you can do so just from, you know, your phone.
Speaker B:That's great.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:The avenues for listening to your consumer are greater than they've ever been.
Speaker B:I mean, you put it in that context.
Speaker B:All right, so I'm curious.
Speaker B:We were talking about this a little bit before we got started at wr.
Speaker B:You're at wrc?
Speaker B:Have you been here before?
Speaker C:This is my first time.
Speaker B:First time.
Speaker B:Okay.
Speaker B:What are your takeaways so far?
Speaker B:What's your impression of the conference?
Speaker C:I think it's been fantastic.
Speaker C:It's a smaller group, so about 900, 1,000 people.
Speaker C:A lot of really phenomenal leaders.
Speaker C:There's an incredible openness here and the dialogue and the conversations that are happening both on stage in the breakout sessions over the group meetings has been really informative, very insightful, and I think in such unpredictable times in retail, it's really nice to have forums such as these.
Speaker A:Oh, my gosh.
Speaker A:I'm sure.
Speaker A:Yeah, we've heard that from a lot of people that, you know, it can be lonely at the top sometimes and to be able to be vulnerable with your peers in this community and get so much information from them.
Speaker A:And I'm sure people are learning so much from you as well, Brianne, because like I said, you're the trailblazer in this industry.
Speaker A:And so I'm sure teaching them to fail fast and all those things is really, really helpful.
Speaker A: can we expect from PacSun in: Speaker A:Anything exciting that you're excited about for the rest of the year?
Speaker C:Yeah, so a few things.
Speaker C:I'm really looking forward to the continued evolution of social commerce.
Speaker A:Okay.
Speaker C:We continue to ramp up social commerce across a multitude of platforms, and the creator economy is something I'm really passionate about.
Speaker C:It really, it gives so much more access and it is a more democratized way of doing business.
Speaker C:And so that open platform I'm a huge advocate of and we are really seeing that grow and take off.
Speaker C:In addition to that, we are expanding globally.
Speaker C:So we'll be expanding in the Middle east later this year, and we're looking at other areas of the globe to expand.
Speaker C:So that is very exciting for the brand.
Speaker C:And then, you know, back in the US at home, we're also looking at expansion.
Speaker C:We have seen a huge resurgence and return to malls.
Speaker A:Oh, my gosh.
Speaker A:Yes.
Speaker C:And so that's really important for the youth audiences and so continuing to build community in those cultural hubs of the malls and creating experiences that are very special for the consumer.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:When you talk about social commerce, what kind of platforms are you looking at?
Speaker A:And even the creator commerce, like, what.
Speaker A:What do you think is really going to kind of funnel to the top of your priority list when you think about that?
Speaker C:So TikTok continues to be the most dominant platform in social commerce and the open creator platform right now in terms of volume and revenue.
Speaker C:YouTube Shopping is also percolating.
Speaker C:Something of strong interest for this segment.
Speaker C:And then there's newer platforms that are emerging that we have joined and that we will see and continue to watch, to see how that progress in the audience is.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:Are you guys getting into Substack at all?
Speaker A:I know you mentioned that earlier.
Speaker A:Is that something that you as a brand are getting into?
Speaker C:That is something that the team is looking into.
Speaker C:So we will be publishing on Substack.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:It's so interesting to me.
Speaker A:Well, Brianne, thank you so much.
Speaker A:This has been awesome.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:I was gonna say, too.
Speaker B:I imagine the new store plans are probably top of mind for you, too, like making sure that those stores get opened in the right way over the course of.
Speaker B:You said three years.
Speaker B:The store growth plans are in play for 75 over three years.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker C:We have a fantastic team in place, and they're ensuring that that happens at the right clip.
Speaker B:You get that nailed.
Speaker B:You got some good growth, good comp.
Speaker B:Store growth coming your way.
Speaker B:So.
Speaker B:All right.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker B:So.
Speaker A:And that's it.
Speaker A:Thanks so much to Fusion Group again for helping make all of our coverage possible.
Speaker A:And stay tuned today for more interviews.
Speaker C:Thank you.
Speaker B:And be careful out there.
