 Hi, I'm Rusty Komori, and this is Beyond the Lines on Think Tech, Hawaii. I was the head coach of the Punahou School Boys Varsity Tennis Team for 22 years, and we were fortunate to win 22 consecutive state championships. This show is based on my books Beyond the Lines and Beyond the Game, and it's about inspiration, leadership, and creating a superior culture of excellence. My special guest today is the general manager of Bloomingdale's, Hawaii. She is Lou Tran, and today we are going beyond fashion. Hey, Lou, welcome to Beyond the Lines. Thank you, Rusty. It's an honor and a pleasure to be here. Lou, you have been such a great leader, I mean, throughout your life, and I'm so happy to be friends with you and to really know and talk with you, but can you share a bit about your background? Yeah. Again, thank you for having me. I'm honored to be here and honored to share my background and my history with you. I've been in retail for a long time. It wasn't a career of choice. I just fell into it, going to college, trying to go to school, get a part-time job, and I didn't realize that I liked it so much. Being a very shy person growing up, retail, I felt what gave me kind of like an outlet to become social and to learn how to be social. Since then, I think it took me out of my shell, and I really developed until this person that is very engaging to the community, the people, and also learning about people. It was the best thing that's ever happened to me. Well, Lou, I agree. You're definitely out of your shell. I cannot imagine you ever being in the shell, being shy or anything, but Lou, Bloomingdale's is such a beautiful store. Why is Bloomingdale's a successful company? Well, Bloomingdale's is an amazing company. We stand behind our people. We believe in our people and the community. We build our business around the community and the people that work with us and for us. Even myself as a general manager, I try to infuse myself in the community. That's really what makes a store, right? That's really what makes the business, is the people who live in it. And Lou, what sets you apart from other stores? Is it the type of brands that you have, higher luxury brands, or what is it? So what sets Bloomingdale's a lot of and Bloomingdale's in general across the country uniquely from every other retailer is that we are a fun place to shop. We want to make the environment fun. We welcome our clients, our customers. We want to give them an experience where they want to come back over and over again. We want to be the story of choice for them. So whether it's a wedding, a birthday present, a shower, a baby shower, any type of occasion, we want them to think about Bloomingdale's. And that's why we're unique is we want to grow with our clients throughout their whole life. So Lou, what would you say is your number one goal as general manager to really help build the future of Bloomingdale's? My number one goal here is to induce Hawaii with Bloomingdale's. I would like every single person on this island to experience Bloomingdale's. Just to walk in, feel the atmosphere, feel the environment, feel the fun and the energy. We have something going on every weekend at Bloomingdale's. So there's never a dull moment and we have promotions every single week for every occasion. So you're always getting an amazing deal at Bloomingdale's, but you're shopping designer and luxury. I like that. Lou, as general manager, what would you say is one of your biggest challenges at Bloomingdale's Hawaii? So I think I shared this before with you. The biggest challenge for me personally is, of course, adapting and learning the culture. I think that I had to be humble, right? I knew I would be humble coming to a brand new place by myself, learning the culture and really just understanding and learning the Aloha spirit and really giving back to the community and getting to know people that live here and have a purpose here, not just the business. Lou, I love hearing that. And can you share with our viewers what you offer in Bloomingdale's? For the ones that have never been to Bloomingdale's, what do you offer in the store? So we offer one the experience because we know we can buy anything anywhere and not have to step in the store. We want you to come in, have a great time. You know, it's a multi-generational, multi-transgender, we accept all walks of life and we want every single person to walk into our store and actually fall in love with it. Connect with someone that works there and really experience what we offer. You know, we offer personal stylists. You can shop from head to toe, setting. We can shop for your husband, boyfriend, anybody in your life and we'll find that perfect piece of whatever it is you're looking for, whatever occasion it is. And you always get it at a deal at Bloomingdale's. There's something going on every weekend for everyone. Oh, I love hearing that. And, and Lou, can you share a story or, you know, maybe when you go to another Bloomingdale's store on the mainland, for example? I mean, what, what impresses you or what do you look for? So, you know, I recently was at a mainland store, you know, I was there prior, the same store. I have to tell you the culture is very important. So I walk in and I get greeted multiple times, which is very welcoming. And I also was offered many types of services, like if I needed a fitting room or a different size. And it, as a general manager and someone that's been in retail for this long, you know, that really doesn't exist anymore, right? People just ask you what your needs are and they pick out what you want and they ring you up at the register. But they were welcoming. They got to know me and they actually got me to purchase multiple things, which I wasn't there to buy anything. I have my own Bloomingdale's to shop at. But my point is, is, you know, even the security agent was asking me, how are you welcome to Bloomingdale's? You know, and normally that's not their job. But somehow the environment and the culture was so welcoming and so helpful that I just fell in love with and had to buy everything I can because I wanted to support them. That's what I want. That's why community they'll feel when they walk into our store. Oh, that's really interesting to hear. And as a leader, I mean, you're trying to build consistency at the highest level. I mean, that Bloomingdale's standard. How challenging is it as, you know, as a big company to really try to be up at the standard? And how successful is Bloomingdale's Hawaii compared to other stores? Well, we are a baby store. You know, we've been a baby store for a long time, mainly our businesses, mainly tourism. And, you know, when I got here, we did have to pivot, right? Because the tourism is not here, at least international tourism. But my thing is, how do I get the community to fall in love with us? The challenge is, is we don't have a lot of community support and we don't have a lot of brand awareness. So the first thing we have to do is be brand aware, right? Share Bloomingdale's with the whole island and have them experience us. And I think that once they walk in and they feel that culture of warmth of Aloha and they'll always want to come back and want to come see us. And really, I like to ingrain in my team that we want to build relationships, right? Every single person that we walk into every single day makes a difference, whether it's in our lives or we make a difference in their lives. And how do we uncover that and build upon that? Whether they're buying or not, it doesn't matter. The fact is they're walking in and they're giving us their time and they're experiencing us. That's what I want. Oh, I mean, that's so great to hear because for so many Hawaii people, I mean, they might feel, some people might feel intimidated to go into a really nice store like Bloomingdale's, right? Yeah, they are. And I get it because, you know, I remember the first time I walked into Bloomingdale's 16 years ago. It wasn't something that I'm used to, but I fell in love with it. And so I've been shopping with them and working for them for 15 years because of that one experience I walked into, right? Yeah, and Lou, it's so great because you understand both sides. I mean, the customer experience and then the leadership service experience. And I'm so happy that you brought up culture and your team because you have both of my books and you had gotten my books for your executive leadership team. And what's something that stood out to you in the books? What do you like about it? I love that no matter how good you are, right, as a tennis player or as a leader or as a seller, you'll always learn from someone, right? And there's always room to perfect who you are. And that's what I love about your book is that don't give up, right? Continue going, striving for, you have a line. It's called, what's the line called, like to be that perfect person, right? The perfect tennis player, right? The perfect coach. So I actually am very inspired by that myself. So I would like that, to give that to my team. And I'm hoping that even if they could pick up one chapter, right? One line in the book where it inspires them to be better than who they are today. Oh, I'm glad to hear that, Lou. And, you know, you and I, when we talk, I mean, you're all about striving for that superior culture of excellence. And I know that's what you're trying to remember. And, you know, I always say there's a tremendous difference between a culture of excellence versus a superior culture of excellence. And there's a gigantic difference between attention to details versus superior discipline details. What are your thoughts about that? Well, I'm going to tell you that for myself, at least, I'm still working on that. And I would assume that for my specific store, my team, we are still working towards that. And we do have a long way to go. The difference that we recognize that and we're going to work towards that. It's going to be done in a year or two years. We don't know. But, you know, every time you have change in leadership, changing a teammate, changing a sales professional, you have to pivot, right? And we teach that culture all over again. So to me, the more that you teach it and repeat it, the better you become. So that's I'm looking forward to that. And, you know, the day where you're perfect, it's going to grow up because you're not going to have things to work towards, right? But that's going to be a long ways from now. So I'm not worried about that. Well, Lou, see what you just said there, that's why you're a great leader because the greatest leaders are always learning. And that's what makes them even greater. And I talk about trying to build high achievers. And once we build high achievers, I want to coach them to become superior achievers. And you're someone that is a superior achiever because of what you and I talk about. And how important is it for a leader to really have awareness for themself, for example, like your emotions, but for the emotions of others around you? So for me, when I am joining a team, I want everyone to be successful. I want everyone to be happy. And I want everyone to feel like they have a piece of the pie. They own it. So to me, it's very, very important that my team feels that I care about them and I will do whatever it takes for them and for anyone that works in the building. Because at the end of the day, you know, you can say you care about me and you love me and you want to do all these great things for me. But until you actually show it in action because it's really all about action, right? Then I know you do. And for me, a true leader, I feel, is a leader that works for their team. A leader that gives to their team. A leader that doesn't just take. Someone that always is giving because somehow I'm impacting someone's life every day. Likewise, they're impacting mine. So I want them to feel that from me. I'm happy you brought up words and actions because that's such a huge part of having success with any team. I mean, you have to do what you say. And when you do what you say, you start to build trust and respect with your team. And I like what you said about empathy, too, because you as a leader might have empathy for your team. But the key is the team needs to know that the leader has empathy for them, right? Right, right. Definitely. And, you know, and the only way you can show that is by being there every day with them, going through the experiences with them and teaching how to handle or pivot or remove or add on, right, continue to challenge them every single day in a good way and in a bad way, whichever it is that it needs to be done. Yeah, I totally agree. And, and Lou, you know, I want to ask you what's the biggest reason why you are a successful leader? What's your what do you feel is your biggest strength? My biggest strength, I would say, and it would probably go for many people is the passion, right? The love for what I believe in, the love for what I do and the passion that I infuse myself and I wake up and live blooming dolls, right? And I wake up and I want to be a better person and wake up. I want to do good things. So that's the reason why I feel like that makes me successful. Yeah, I love that you said passion, because I know how passionate you are. And I always say that, you know, everyone's a reflection of each other. You are a reflection of your entire team. And your team is a reflection of you. And I know how deeply you care about the personal growth for every member on your team to try to get them to be a high achiever. And once they get there to become a superior achiever, right? Correct, yes, definitely. Now, Lou, tell me about your very popular in-store events because I love to go to those. Yeah, well, not that. You know, we have occasions where we have amazing events. The first thing I would like to share is every third weekend of the month, we do a local pop up shop where we invite local small businesses to pop up in Bloomingdale's. So the guests in Hawaii can come in to shop and check out Bloomingdale's. On the other hand, support their local businesses and local vendors. So that's one that we do. You know, we had our beautiful LGBT pride walk, right? And we had a show in our store and it was very well received. We also have the makeup data events. This weekend, we're having a Sue Masterclass. There's always something going on, you know, and I'm always working on bringing new experiences into our store. Hopefully, we'll nail down a spa soon, always bringing in new vendors as well. We're always trying new things to intrigue and give interest to our guests and to our customers. And Lou, it's so brilliant to do what you're doing for these in-store events to help other, you know, pop up local business leaders as well. You recently had an in-store event with the Paris, I mean, a Paris France themed event. How did that happen? Oh, yes, that's a huge event. So we do small, medium and really large scale events. The Allianz-François event that we hosted is a charity event. We supported that charity itself. And we also supported Maui, where the donations goes to the Maui fire and the victims are affected. But we hosted about 300 guests. Talk about fashion. We, the spirit of the whole event is actually Paris Fashion Week, but in Hawaii. If you weren't able to go to Paris, if you're here in Hawaii, you just have to go to what he does. So there was about a 40 minute fashion show, multiple French and Paris wine, spoons. We even had a VIP lounge and it was a fun festivity. I think that won the event and our guests didn't even want to leave. So it was awesome. Well, Lou, I know that with your events, it's really hard to leave because everyone's having such a great time. I mean, whether they're, you know, the people that are working the event or whether they're a guest there, I mean, it seems like everyone's just having a great time. It's such a positive atmosphere that you've created, right? Yes, that's what we want. We want people to come in and have that amazing experience with us. Now, Lou, I want to ask you about, you know, the generational differences that you see, I mean, Gen X or, you know, whatever the case is, what what do you see in terms of people coming to shop in-store versus people shopping online? So, you know, the pandemic has actually affected many, many businesses, big, small, medium-sized. It's actually taught us at Bloomingdale's to pivot our business, right? We have customers that normally only shop online, which is the younger generation. And you have your more mature generation, the baby boomers and above. Normally love to go into the store. You know, that is the biggest demographic for us normally, generally. However, that's actually changed. During the pandemic, they've reverted to learn how to shop online and now prefer to shop online. Whereas the younger generation likes to do all their research, walk into the store, check it out. And if the experience is the right experience, they will make that purchase. If the experience is not what they want or what they like, they will not make that purchase. And they'll revert right back online to get it online. So that's why it's really, really key to when the customer walks into your building, that you give them that experience. That is so memorable, right? And even if they didn't want to buy anything like myself, I actually bought everything. So that's the experience that I want people to experience. And if they don't get that connection, they're probably not going to make their purchase. And Lou, you oversee, I mean, your operation is very big. And how many divisions do you have within your store? And what are they? Oh, wow. How many divisions? So many. But the main divisions are we have our own home, right? Everything to do with your home, except for large furniture. We have the men's department. We have a children's department. We have a women's ready to wear department. We also have fine jewelry, fashion accessories, shoes from head to toe, anything you can think of. And of course, the most fun department is the Cosmetics and Fragrance department. We have your nice designer handbags, but really you can buy anything else, anything and everything. So as a leader, knowing that, I mean, how do you get everyone working together? I mean, striving for that same superior culture of excellence in every department. So the first thing is caring. If they generally care and love what they do. So that's the first thing you think about when you're looking for someone to hire. Do they generally love retail? Do they generally love people and do they really care? Because if you have those three things, you can teach everything else, right? You could teach the job, but you can't teach someone to care. You can't teach someone to have passion and you can't teach someone to love retail. If they have all of those three qualifications, they're going to give their best every day when they come to work. Even if they don't know it, they're going to learn how and they'll figure it out. But that's the most important thing to me, just like myself. I mean, if you go somewhere and you feel like someone genuinely cares about you and wants to take care of you, you're going to want to always go back there. Yeah, you're so right. I mean, you can feel when somebody is being authentic, when they really want to help you. I mean, just like your example, when you were in Bloomingdale's on the mainland and you had no intention of purchasing things, but then you were buying everything because of how that person made you feel. And is that something that, I mean, not everybody has that, but you're trying to look for those types of people and then you're trying to coach them. You can coach the job, right? Yes, we can coach the job. We actually have a plan of action when we hire someone. What we want is for them to create a customer for life. A customer for life is someone that's always going to come back for every occasion in their life to go to Bloomingdale's and pick out what they want and what their needs are because they trust that Bloomingdale will have it for them. And if they don't have it, they're gonna get it for them. So that's the whole point is we want every customer to shop with us. They're a whole lifetime. Yeah, and that's why earlier you had said how important building relationships are and it's building relationships with your team members but also with your clients like you just said right there. And Lou, I know how busy you are. How do you keep balance in your life, a work life balance to stay sane and healthy? Well, you have to work hard when you're there. I have a calendar that keeps me on track and today I messed it up but it tells me exactly what I need to do and what I don't need to do. And then when I do have my open space and my slots, I have a little bit of downtime but I have to tell you when I'm off, I try really hard to like just stay off because I wanna be mentally ready when I go back into the store for everyone, the customer, my team, anyone that needs anything from me, I'm fully ready for that. I think what you just said there is so important because for me when I'm training other executives or leadership teams, it's so important when you're off to be 100% off. Sometimes people are 50% off mentally and still 50% on and that's not being completely off, right? Right, that isn't being completely off. You know, like on your time off you gotta do things that you enjoy, you know, whether it's going for a walk, you know, people surf here and swim, catching up with friends, going to an event. I mean, there's so much to do, so much to do here. So Lou, what, since you moved to Hawaii, what's some of the exciting things that you like to do in Hawaii? Well, I do love my walks, right? It is the most beautiful weather in the world. It's why I'm here in Hawaii, my walks. I'm trying to learn tennis again. So I told you, I just got my racquets and my balls. So hopefully I'm gonna be able to go play some tennis, but really just enjoying the weather and the environment. That's so important to me. I mean, I've visited almost every single beach, right? I've gone on tons of tours and also gotten like on one of those sunset cruises and there's so much to do here, but it's enjoying the simple things in life. Yeah, I totally agree. And Lou, I'm so happy that you bought your tennis racket. You bought tennis balls and you're excited to start tennis. That's so fun. Yeah, yeah. I'm gonna get on the court, don't worry. Now Lou, I wanna ask you one more thing before we wrap up. When you reflect back on your life so far, what's a valuable lesson you've learned? For me, growing up in a very cultural family background, I said I was really shy, right? And I was really shy, rusty. I didn't even look at people in my eyes when I talked to them. I just responded and looked down, but I think that that's taken me away from getting to know people growing up, right? And even in my adult life, it wasn't a priority for me, but now it is so rewarding for me now to realize that every single person that I meet means a lot to me and getting to know them means a lot to me because I know whether I'm gonna teach them something or they're gonna teach me something and we're gonna bring each other a wonderful piece to gather a connection, something very unique and different. So I learned to appreciate people and people that I do meet every single day. I'm really grateful for that opportunity. Well, Lou, I love hearing your insights and thank you for taking time to be on the show today. People now know why you're a great leader and hopefully they'll stop in at Bloomingdale's. Thank you, Lou. Thank you so much, Trustee. And thank you for watching Beyond the Lines on Think Tech Hawaii. For more information, please visit RustyKomori.com and my books are available on Amazon and Barnes & Noble. I hope that Lou and I will inspire you to create your own superior culture of excellence and to find your greatness and help others find theirs. Aloha.