Success Leaves Clues: The Merchant’s Playbook
How great merchants shortcut trial and error and build what’s next.
Originality gets a lot of attention, and there’s absolutely a place for it, especially when establishing a brand’s voice, identity, or point of view. But when it comes time to expand into new categories, new audiences, or new channels, chasing originality for its own sake can become a trap.
Tony Robbins said it best: “Success leaves clues.” Why spend years on trial and error when you can learn from those who’ve already figured it out? This isn’t about copying. It’s about collapsing time.
The best merchants know how to spot what’s working (products, formats, pricing strategies, even customer behavior), and interpret it through the lens of their own brand. They don’t need to chase novelty. They find the clearest path to relevance, then elevate it with great design, storytelling, and restraint.
Too often, brands waste time trying to stand out by being different, when what’s really needed is to be right - right for the customer, right for the category, right for the brand.
Model What Works - Then Make It Yours
Let’s say you're a brand like Ten Thousand, looking to expand beyond your core training gear. Instead of guessing what your customer wants next, look at adjacent spaces where the same customer already shops.
A Ten Thousand athlete is disciplined, performance-driven, and minimalist. So what happens when he's not training? He’s probably traveling, hiking, decompressing, or seeking utility in motion. That’s where you look at brands like Arc’teryx, Snow Peak, or Fjällräven and ask: What are they making that speaks to this mindset? What product types are winning? What gaps could we reinterpret through our lens?
Maybe it’s a shell jacket. Maybe it’s a modular pack system. The point is, the demand already exists. Your job is to meet it with your own taste, voice, and discipline.
Merchants Are the Manifestors
Great product doesn’t start with a sketchpad, it starts with observation, intuition, and strategy. That’s what merchants do. They’re not just buyers or planners. They’re the connective tissue between vision and execution.
A strategic merchant sees the whitespace, understands the customer, and has the aesthetic clarity to know what feels right. Then they partner with design, development, and marketing to bring it to life. Not as a one-off, but as part of a larger brand ecosystem.
They don’t guess. They curate, translate, and build.
3 Foundational Questions Every Merchant Should Be Asking:
Where is my customer spending time and money outside our current assortment?
What other brands are already winning in those parts of their lifestyle?
Which category staples from those adjacent spaces could we reinterpret in a way that’s brand-right for us?
These are the building blocks. They help you see the landscape clearly. But step one is just that… step one.
What Separates Good Merchants From Great Ones?
Once you’ve identified the opportunity, the real question becomes: What will you do with it?
Here’s where strategic vision takes over:
What emotional or functional gap is this product solving, and can we do it better? Not just a version of what’s out there. A version that fits our brand more intuitively. Better material. Better cut. Better story.
What’s the product that feels inevitable for our brand to make? Not the loudest move, the most obvious one, in hindsight. When brand, customer, and whitespace align, that’s your signal.
How do we make it feel like it was always part of our world? The best expansion doesn’t feel like a pivot. It feels like a natural next chapter.
Final Thought
This is what I love about strategic merchandising: It’s not about being loud, it’s about being aligned.
So don’t waste time forging a brand new path when there’s a proven one right in front of you. Study what works. Interpret it with taste. Build what’s next.
The world doesn’t need more noise, it needs more clarity.
