Speaking Engagements
CMA | SIMA 2025 Conference
Innovative Ideas for Omni-Store Excellence
In today's fast-evolving retail environment, businesses are constantly balancing the changing needs of the shopper, the pressures of the economic climate, and the relentless drive for innovation. The 2025 conference will explore how to manage this delicate retail balancing act.
How do you elevate the shopping experience and make it more compelling? Join Kevin Kelley as he shares everything he's learned in the field and the boardroom in his debut book, Irreplaceable: How to Create Extraordinary Places that Bring People Together.
Sign up here!
The NGA Show 2025
Shaping the Future of Grocery: Innovation, Disruption, and the Next Generation of Store Design
The NGA Show is the only show created exclusively for the grocery industry and brings together a community of independent grocers and the food retail industry to learn, engage, share, network, and innovate.
Join Kevin Kelley for two sessions: "Tech Innovation Summit" (Sunday) and "Shaping the Future of Grocery" (Monday). As a lifelong advocate of bringing people together in prosocial settings, Kevin's expertise is in studying how the environment of a place affects our behavior, perception, and decision-making.
Join us at this exciting event here!
Shoptalk Spring 2025
Track Speech
Shoptalk Spring 2025 will bring together a speaking faculty of over 200 luminaries and 10,000 attendees across retail, consumer brands, and retail tech. It is where the future of retail is defined.
Join Kevin Kelley (Thursday, March 27 at 10:15AM) for his insights working with executive leaders in their efforts to develop new kinds of immersive brand experiences that have the power to convene people in places.
Sign up here!
Past Speaking Engagements
CNU 31 Charlotte
CNU 31 Walking Tours
The Congress for the New Urbanism is bringing its 31st annual Congress to the Queen City May 31 to June 3, and we are excited to convene in our home town! Many efforts of our firm from the past 30+ years will be showcased, from Historic South End, to communities like Birkdale Village, Antiquity and more.
Our firm will be participating in three of the scheduled CNU 31 walking tours — A New Hope (VI) and 5 Points Forward on May 31, and No Cars Allowed - Neighborhood Development on June 2. One of the two featured Hope VI neighborhoods is Brightwalk, the transformation of a former housing project into a mixed-income, mixed-use, intergenerational community that has become a national model of community development. 5 Points Forward is a grassroots urban vision planning effort for the 5 Points Plaza area in the Historic West End of Charlotte — a public planning process that has brought the residents together to frame the vision for their own neighborhood. The No Cars Allowed - Neighborhood Development tour will feature new mixed-use residential projects that are providing alternate methods of transportation without the typical parking requirements found in traditional multifamily developments.
For more information, click here.
NRF '25 Retail's Big Show
Making Your Stores Irreplaceable: How Retailers Can Survive and Thrive in the Replacement Economy
We live in an age where everything can be replaced through an app on a handheld device. So, how can physical stores compete with these easier, cheaper, and more convenient digital replacements? They can tap into other human desires, such as the need for sensory stimulation, belonging to a community, and participating in cultural celebrations. For the last three decades, Kevin Ervin Kelley—an experience designer and author of IRREPLACEABLE—has been helping retailers compete on dimensions other than price, variety, and convenience. During this provocative presentation, he will outline the key principles, tools, and techniques he and his team deploy to help retailers deliver store experiences that are irreplaceable.
Learn more and register here.
Columbus Region Economic Development 411
Keynote Speech
Economic development is constantly evolving. Keeping up with the latest challenges and opportunities is essential for staying relevant and effective. Join Kevin Kelley for his keynote speech and reshape your outlook on the Region's future and your role in it.
ED411 is where ideas flourish and partnerships grow. Learn more and join the conversation here!