Where We've Been This Fall: A September and October Recap from Roswell NYC
Where We've Been This Fall: A September and October Recap from Roswell NYC
If you think it's been quiet around here lately, think again.
September through mid-October has been one of the busiest stretches of the year for the Roswell team, and we have the frequent flyer miles to prove it. Here is where we have been.
K:BOS, Boston
K:BOS in Boston kicked off the fall. Nihar Kulkarni, Managing Director, and Emily Roberts, VP of Growth Marketing, spent time with the Klaviyo team and the partners building around it, and the direction was clear. Klaviyo is positioning itself as an autonomous B2C CRM. It is now headless, so Claude, ChatGPT, or any AI system a team already uses can operate it. Composer is moving from something you prompt to something that keeps working in the background, and SQL access is now in preview.
For our merchants, that means customer data, decisioning, and execution converging in one platform. The brands that get their data architecture right now will move fastest, and Klaviyo is setting the pace.
Nihar joined fellow agency and technology partner executives for the Klaviyo Partner Advisory Council, while Emily represented Roswell through her role in the Klaviyo Community Champions. The team also caught up with Matt Tague and the Hyperlite Mountain Gear team, one of our marquee merchants, and spent time with Nosto, Envive, PostPilot, Hiro Analytics, Ethos, The Partner Engine, and many more partners shaping the ecosystem.
Smile Agency Summit, Montreal
From Boston, the team headed to Montreal for the Smile Agency Summit, an executive retreat hosted by Smile for a select group of agency leaders. Nihar Kulkarni and Emily Roberts joined peers from Lazer, Softlimit, Absolute Web, Symmetry Commerce, Praella, Studio Maze Design, Arcady Media, and Urban Folk Consulting for two days focused on how loyalty fits alongside AI investments for the brands we serve.
A standout was the loyalty presentation from Katrina Bossotti and Mason Sergent of HOKA and Deckers Brands. They shared their approach to building a loyalty program that delivers real value to their high lifetime value customers and creates more of them in the process.
Thank you to Mike Rossi, Bill Curtis, Rob Domagala, Fiona Evans, and Matt Hennessy of the Smile team for being such gracious hosts.
CartStars Golden Cart Awards, New York
The CartStars Golden Cart Awards brought hundreds of brand-side eCommerce leaders to Cipriani Wall Street for a black-tie dinner and awards ceremony presented by Klaviyo. Nihar attended as a guest of Klaviyo. CartStars, founded by Debbie Pearce, is an invitation-only network of eCommerce and retail executives who rely on one another for peer-to-peer consulting, and Roswell is proud to be in the orbit of this community. The night was a reminder of how much the industry's best operators learn from one another.
Among those Nihar spent time with was Claudia Goncalves, VP of Growth, Marketing & Digital at ElieTahari.com. As head of eCommerce at DVF.com, Claudia led the 2025 redesign that won the People's Voice Award at the 29th Annual Webby Awards. The recognition belongs first to her vision and leadership, and Roswell was proud to build the redesign alongside her and share the award as co-recipient. It was meaningful to be back in the Cipriani Wall Street room where that Webby was accepted. We are fortunate to work with Claudia and both brands.
Recharge and Skio, Brooklyn
Nihar also met with Callie Calimlim, Senior Partner Manager at Recharge, at Dumbo House in Brooklyn for a strategic planning session on how Roswell and Recharge will go to market together in Q4 and through 2027. With Skio now part of Recharge, the focus is on introducing more merchants to how the platform is innovating eCommerce in the "routine economy," where customers rely on the products they reorder and the subscriptions they keep.
An agency dinner at Beefbar
Nihar sat down at Beefbar in Manhattan with Jason Sidana, Chief Growth Officer and Founder of Midknight Genius, and Peter Kang, CEO and Founder of Barrel Holdings, a holding company for agencies. Each has spent years leading agencies, and the three have known one another for a long time. They shared candid outlooks on the agency model in an era of AI disruption. It is the kind of peer relationship Roswell values, with leaders trading what they are learning and supporting one another's growth. Rising tides lift all boats.
The Webby Awards
Nihar also visited The Webby Awards offices in New York, where he sat down with Nick Borenstein, General Manager of The Webby Awards, to be interviewed for content ahead of the 2027 Webby Awards. The conversation covered his perspective on eCommerce in the age of AI, what stands out in eCommerce design, and what makes work Webby Award-winning.
As an Executive Member of the International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences (IADAS), the body behind the Webbys, Nihar has been selected as a Jury President for the upcoming awards season.
Fashinnovation
The fall also included a Fashinnovation happy hour at an undisclosed speakeasy in Lower Manhattan. If you know, you know. It was a night to celebrate Founder Marcelo Guimaraes on his birthday and to connect with peers across digital, eCommerce, and the fashion industry. Fashinnovation is a global platform that connects the fashion and technology worlds, and fashion is a vertical close to Roswell's work with brands like DVF.com and ElieTahari.com.
Shoptalk Fall, Nashville
James Roberts, VP of Business Development & Strategy, represented Roswell at Shoptalk Fall in Nashville (September 29 to October 1). He met with brand partners including Boyne Country Sports and Lord & Taylor, and with tech partners including Conative, Tailor, Gorgias, Attentive, Heatmap, Channable, and Shopify. Between sessions there was line dancing and plenty of live music, and the team spent the week learning and celebrating alongside partners and clients.
Shopify Partner Day, New York
After James got back from Nashville, Nihar Kulkarni attended Shopify Partner Day at Shopify's New York office near Chelsea Market. He connected with Nassim Najm, Roswell's Partner Development Manager at Shopify, and caught up with old friends at Shopify including Stephanie Mace, Michelle Drawert, and Adena Merabi, alongside countless agency colleagues. Presentations from tech partners and from Shopify laid out the vision for eCommerce in 2027 and beyond.
Beyond Yoga NYC pop-up
Roswell also co-sponsored a shopping night put on by Rebuy and Smile at the Beyond Yoga NYC pop-up. Zia Rashed - Business Development Manager, and newest member of the Roswell team alongside Nihar hosted brand attendees who received a gift card and compared notes on personalization and loyalty strategies for their own brands as they head into BFCM, the most important time of the year for our industry.
A new partnership
Roswell is thrilled to announce our strategic partnership with Heatmap.com. Kenn Palm, CEO of Heatmap, is leading the charge on their side to craft an innovative, partner-led approach to conversion rate optimization (CRO). The goal is to change how CRO is done and to drive revenue for Roswell brands, and for the brands that come into the fold needing a world-class Shopify Platinum agency to grow DTC revenue in the age of AI disruption. A separate post with more is coming soon.
What comes next
It was a whirlwind. Events season is winding down, but BFCM is ramping up. We are bullish on the future of DTC eCommerce as it enters the Agentic Commerce phase, and Roswell is all in. Reach out to discuss how we can help your brand become agentic commerce ready. Email us at [email protected] and we will send our agentic commerce readiness checklist. We can also show you how Shopify Catalog, paired with Roswell's understanding of this space, can help your brand harness the channel before you get left behind.