Grey vs. Black

Black swans are events that arrive unannounced and knock even the most forward thinkers flat, second-guessing, “how could anyone have known?” But there is another category that does far more cumulative damage to companies, and we have no good excuse for overlooking it. Grey swans are visible, often discussed, obsessively written about, and a concern in analyst reports, conferences, and year-end strategy reviews. But these trends are typically quietly filed away as “someone else’s problem.” The grey swan is not the surprise. The surprise is that we were surprised in the first place.

Noise confirms a headline story, whereas a signal challenges conventional thinking. Most impressive, over-produced trend reports are dressed-up noise. The real signal predicting business risk or opportunity is usually buried layers deeper. Grey swan developments are inconvenient truths; if not taken seriously, they can derail a business.

Three Signals in Plain Sight

At Randa, for every emerging force reshaping our industry, our team asks the same three questions: What do other people see? What do they miss? What does it mean for our business? This exercise unlocks the associated risks to grey swans that could change the future of our brands. Three grey swans are looming on retail’s horizon, largely dismissed as headline news. But when you put these developments through a retail lens, the implications are significant. Three signals reveal the same pattern every time.

• Other people see extreme weather and boring sustainability reports. What they miss are port closures, insurance costs, and sourcing instability that migrate straight into their margins. A supplier in the wrong floodplain is a problem. A consumer with an uninsurable home, recalibrating what discretionary spending means, is an opportunity. And when and where to place raingear, sun hats, and cold-weather accessories is nothing a weather app will tell you. What does climate risk mean to your business? It’s not a communications strategy; it’s a supply chain audit, demand forecast, and customer profile, all in flux simultaneously, that need to be managed.

• GLP-1s. What other people see is celebrity weight loss, pharmaceutical profiteering, and another temporary wellness wave. What they miss is that the economics of GLP-1 are about to change everything. When the cost of treatment drops from $500 a month to $25, and delivery moves from refrigerated injection to a simple pill, access expands at scale. The GLP-1 evidence is already clear: Bodies and cravings change, and apparel fit and category demand change. According to Circana research released this May, 36 percent of Americans say they will try the pill when it becomes affordable, and 80 percent of current users say they expect to buy a new wardrobe. So, what does this mean for retail? When that $475 is freed up each month, it will go somewhere. Does your company know how to capture this potential discretionary spend before your competitor does?

• Aging America. This is the grey swan that is also the elephant in the room. Other people see a graying population, rising healthcare costs, and a retirement savings crisis. What they miss is that by 2030, there will be more Americans over 65 than under 18, for the first time in recorded history. Older Americans already control more than 70 percent of total wealth in this country. They are a serious consumer that is systematically underserved by nearly every brand, retail store, and digital experience. Meanwhile, older homeowners who are aging in place are freezing housing turnover that suppresses new home-related purchases historically driving apparel, home goods, and lifestyle spending for younger households. What does it mean for your business? Prepare for an addressable market with product, store experiences, marketing creative, and digital UX. If your most valuable consumer feels invisible, she will eventually abandon you and shop somewhere else that sees her. The grey swan is not that people are aging, it’s that we keep designing for the customer we wish we still had.

How to Block Out the Noise

I help lead Randa, a global apparel and accessories company. We produce over 100 million units a year: belts under Levi’s and Calvin Klein, Totes umbrellas, Haggar dress pants and sport jackets, Tommy Hilfiger and Cole Haan accessories. We own over 100 menswear stores, most in the UK. We are exposed to the noise I’ve been describing.

As the Iran conflict escalated and the closing of the Strait of Hormuz became real, we saw something more than a geopolitical event dominating a frightening news cycle. Polyester is a petrochemical, as is fertilizer. Higher energy costs bleed into transportation, food, and household budgets. Goldman Sachs reported nitrogen fertilizer prices up 40 percent since the conflict began, with more than a quarter of global nitrogen trade transiting the Strait of Hormuz. Reuters documented polyester feedstock costs rising nearly 30 percent at major Asian mills. The American Apparel & Footwear Association reported polyester textile materials surging from 90 cents to $1.33 per kilogram as suppliers scrambled to replace the Middle East supply. And tariffs, already reshaping sourcing costs, margin structure, and pricing anxiety, were compounding every one of those pressures.

So, we brought in two experts, a senior economist and a former CIA intelligence analyst. We created four scenarios analyzing the different ways the conflict could evolve, each with distinct implications for our supply chain, material costs, freight lanes, and consumers.

One scenario described Iran effectively monetizing the Strait, imposing a permanent cost on global shipping. Another imagined simultaneous closure of the Strait and the Red Sea, resulting in astronomic freight rates. A third involved a ceasefire followed by internal collapse in Iran, enforcing chronic uncertainty into insurance markets and lead times that would never recover. The fourth was the world our supply chains were designed for: a negotiated resolution. And the temptation, in that scenario, is to do nothing — to treat the return to normalcy as a reason to defer the restructuring we should have done anyway.

The answer across all four scenarios revealed the same strategy: diversify our supply chain, manufacturing, freight routes, products, price points, and distribution channels. The exercise re-engineered our operations. Every core product now must be sourced from at least three factories, in at least three regions—even if it costs more and takes longer. Our CEO said it plainly: “A business built around a single geography, a single distribution channel, a single supply chain scenario is not lean. It’s exposed.” That is the lesson Iran taught us, one we could only learn from because we started to ask the right questions.

None of the tools in your tech stack will flag a geopolitical event as a demand operations signal. No dashboard will surface the second-order effect of GLP-1 adoption on your accessories category. And no algorithm will connect aging-in-place to the collapse of the move-up housing purchase cycle. The information gaps have to be closed deliberately by people willing to ask the questions that their data doesn’t measure.