---
title: "WADE at The LEAD Summit 2026"
url: https://stacklist.com/card/32b58b5a-4a06-482b-b712-46797637c4d9
source_url: "https://stacklist.com/c/events/stack/0ca7f6eb-9515-497f-bf39-20e742781ebb"
stack: https://stacklist.com/c/events/stack/9c4b9e68-5570-491c-a7a7-d7780bf69af5
summary: "The Lead Summit 2026 is a premier event for brands held May 20-21 in New York City, featuring 3,000+ executives, 150+ speakers, and focused discussions on AI, ecommerce, retail innovation, and DTC strategies. Key themes include brand identity, physical retail bifurcation, community engagement, and the importance of knowing customers before channels."
tags: "lead-summit-2026, retail-ecommerce, brand-strategy, dtc-symposium, ai-innovation, customer-experience, event-recap"
key_entities: "The Lead Summit 2026 (event), New York City (location), Pier 36 (location), The Lead (organization), Anthropologie (organization), e.l.f. Beauty (organization), A. Candan Erenguc (person), Carrie Gross (person), DTC (Direct-to-Consumer) (concept), AI (technology)"
classification: "reference"
content_hash: "sha256:9dbd6b0c7c46ab497ba968088bb8a888d68c9d9801b9d422dc023104696de20b"
acp_version: "0.2"
token_counts_approximate: 2329
visibility: public
agent_accessible: true
status: "final"
---

# WADE at The LEAD Summit 2026

summit.the-lead.co The Lead Summit 2026 May 20-21, 2026 - New York City: The only event built specifically for brands. 3,000+ senior retail and ecommerce executives. 150+ speakers. Two days at Pier 36, NYC — covering AI, ecommerce, stores, customer experience, and what's next for brand and retail. Join them shaping the future of brand retail at The Lead Summit 2026. movewithwade summit.the-lead.co Agenda | The Lead Summit 2026 The 2026 agenda will boldly explore the new frontier of brand and retail at The Lead Summit. movewithwade summit.the-lead.co Speakers | The Lead Summit 2026 These are newsmakers, innovators and visionaries driving outsized success at their brands. From seasoned leaders to exceptional practitioners, you’ll hear insights and experiences that inspire and inform. movewithwade summit.the-lead.co The DTC Symposium | The Lead Summit 2026 Join The DTC Symposium at The Lead Summit 2026 to build meaningful connections, develop core capabilities and define strategies for growth. This is where the future of DTC takes shape. movewithwade instagram.com The Lead (@theleadco) | Instagram The Lead (@theleadco) on Instagram showcases photos and videos related to The Lead Summit 2026, taking place on May 20-21 in New York City. Join over 3,000 attendees and 150 speakers focused on the future of brands. movewithwade linkedin.com The Lead | LinkedIn The Lead is a media and events company that helps brands compete in an increasingly digital and direct selling environment by introducing future business trends, presenting winning strategies, and connecting them with the right technologies. It showcases actionable insights across marketing, ecommerce, stores, customer experience, and the last mile for brands selling direct. movewithwade linkedin.com WADE at The LEAD Summit - DAY 1 WADE's Day 1 recap from The Lead Summit 2026. Brand conviction, physical retail's bifurcation, AI greenwashing, and the contrarian CTV take of the day — all from the floor at Pier 36, NYC. movewithwade clickz.com The Lead Summit Day 1 Recap - ClickZ AI came up in almost every room today. It was not the real subject. The real subject was identity: whether a brand knows what it stands for clearly enough to use new tools in ways that actually reinforce it, rather than erode it. movewithwade linkedin.com WADE at The LEAD Summit - DAY 2 This page reflects on the key takeaways from Day 2 at The LEAD Summit, emphasizing the importance of community engagement, operational consistency, and authenticity in brand strategies. It discusses how brands can adapt to market changes and the evolving expectations of consumers and founders. movewithwade clickz.com What Day 2 at The Lead Summit Was Really About - ClickZ Know Your Customer Before You Know Your Channel. Multiple sessions on day 2 came back to the same starting point: you cannot build community, pick the right retail partner, or brief a creator if you have not answered the identity question first. At e.l.f. Beauty, that answer is a three-question filter. movewithwade linkedin.com A. Candan Erenguc - Chief Operating Officer at Anthropologie A. Candan Erenguc, Chief Operating Officer of Anthropologie Group at The Lead Summit 2026: physical retail isn't dying — it's bifurcating. The brands winning in stores treat them as destinations, not transactions. Styling. Concierge. Inspiration. The human connection everyone worries AI will replace? That's actually the moat. movewithwade linkedin.com Anthropologie | LinkedIn Anthropologie is a unique, full-lifestyle destination that aspires to bring creativity, optimism, and inspiration to our customers, every day. Offering an unlike-anywhere-else assortment with an artisan spirit and a global point of view, Anthropologie prizes curiosity and discovery – and engages in constant, perspective-broadening conversation with our creative-minded community. movewithwade linkedin.com Carrie Gross - Chief Creative Officer and Co-Founder of Dr. Dennis Gross Skincare Carrie Gross, CCO & Co-Founder of Dr. Dennis Gross Skincare at The Lead Summit 2026: one product, one conviction, no trend-chasing. When something didn't work, they said so. That honesty isn't a campaign — it's the brand. Anti-trend isn't a limitation. It's the strategy. movewithwade linkedin.com Dr. Dennis Gross Skincare | LinkedIn Dr. Dennis Gross Skincare™ was established in 2000 as a line of multi-tasking products that help skin meet its most beautiful potential – providing dramatic results within days and a long-term transformation with continued use. Inspired by his loyal following, Dr. Dennis Gross continues to innovate and expand his skincare offerings. movewithwade linkedin.com Natasha Fishman - Chief Marketing Officer of Marquee Brands Natasha Fishman, CMO of Marquee Brands at The Lead Summit 2026: authority without relevance is nostalgia. Relevance without authority is noise. Legacy brands don't need reinvention — they need recommitment. Conviction to your brand DNA isn't just for a season. It's for a generation. movewithwade linkedin.com Marquee Brands | LinkedIn Marquee Brands is the premier accelerator of timeless brands, unlocking value and building global influence. The company owns and manages a portfolio of established global brands across consumer products and channels, focusing on driving organic growth through brand extensions, impactful marketing, and direct consumer engagement. movewithwade linkedin.com David Cost - VP of Digital & Ecommerce at Rainbow Apparel Co David Cost, VP of Digital & Ecommerce at Rainbow Apparel Co at The Lead Summit 2026: "AI greenwashing." Misrepresent your AI use and you're liable. Tools built to eliminate talent have failed. Tools built to augment it haven't. The business is the strategy — not the AI. movewithwade linkedin.com Rainbow Apparel Co | LinkedIn Rainbow Apparel Co is a moderately-priced American retail apparel company with 30,360 followers on LinkedIn. Established in 1935 and based in Brooklyn, New York, Rainbow primarily targets teens, young women, plus size women, and children with fashion-conscious and affordable styles. movewithwade linkedin.com Matt Skai - Private Equity Operating Principal at L Catterton Matt Skai, Operating Principal at L Catterton (Birkenstock, iFIT, Tod's) at The Lead Summit 2026: brands writing off CTV aren't seeing a channel problem — they're seeing a creative problem. The data gets misread. The channel takes the blame. Fix the creative first. The contrarian take of the day and the most actionable. movewithwade linkedin.com L Catterton | LinkedIn L Catterton is a market-leading consumer-focused investment firm, managing approximately $39 billion of equity capital across three multi-product platforms: private equity, credit, and real estate. The firm's funds have the ability to invest between $5 million and $5 billion, partnering with management teams to drive differentiated value creation across its portfolio. movewithwade linkedin.com Marie Chevrier Schwartz - CEO at RETHINK Retail Marie Chevrier Schwartz is a founder, operator, and one of the sharpest minds in retail — joined WADE at The Lead Summit 2026. The best conversations at events like these aren't always on stage. Sometimes they happen between sessions, with the people you trust most. movewithwade rethink.industries RETHINK Retail - Breakfast Session WADE joined the RETHINK Retail Breakfast on Day 2 of The Lead Summit 2026 — one of the best rooms for retail leaders navigating what's next. The kind of conversation that only happens in person, over coffee, before the day begins. movewithwade linkedin.com Jake Galtere - Chief Marketing Officer at Naturium Jake Galtere of NATURIUM at The Lead Summit 2026: community is not an audience. Audiences listen to you, customers buy from you — communities engage with each other. If your community goes quiet when you step back, you have an audience, not a community. NATURIUM built their entire product development pipeline on it. Result: fastest growing skincare brand in the US top 50, up 2.5x in one year. movewithwade linkedin.com NATURIUM | LinkedIn NATURIUM is a skincare brand with 12,508 followers on LinkedIn. They offer clinically effective, skin compatible, and thoughtfully formulated skincare products for all skin types. movewithwade linkedin.com Mariam Naficy - Founder of Arcade Mariam Naficy, founder of Arcade and previously Minted, at The Lead Summit 2026: the value chain is collapsing. Manufacturers want consumer data, retailers want design capability, creators want to own what they sell. The brands treating their lane as fixed will be squeezed. The window to build flexibility is open now. movewithwade linkedin.com Arcade | LinkedIn Arcade is building the world’s first AI physical product creation platform, where imagination becomes reality. Our platform lets anyone design, purchase, and sell custom, manufacturable products using natural language and generative AI. movewithwade More from WADE's Workspace 9 public stacks · Events View profile The Capital Table 8 cards Who is WADE? 8 cards Operator Intelligence 7 cards Founder & Brand Advisory 7 cards View profile — all 9 stacks Explore more in Events →