Mattel and Walmart Execs Harmonizing Innovation and Transformation within Legacy Brands

In this episode of the MTM Visionaries Podcast recorded on 10/25, Lisa McKnight, EVP and Chief Brand Officer at Mattel, Inc., and William White, SVP and Chief Marketing Officer at Walmart, came together to discuss how they marry innovation with tradition for their legacy brands.   

Throughout the conversation they shared valuable insights and brand strategies, including aligning your brand’s purpose to every action, balancing tradition and innovation, creating maximum touchpoints across physical and digital experiences, inspiring innovation across the organization, and most excitedly–the Walmart and Mattel Barbie Cart campaign with that surprised and delighted everyone involved in terms of engagement.  

If you're looking to gain some inspiration and learn more about how you can enhance your team, talent, and career from two of the world's top brand leaders, give this a listen/read and ask yourself these questions to see where your brand stands:   

• Does Your Customer Know Your Why?  
• Who is Your Innovation Serving?  
• Are Your Collaborations Creating a Unique Experience?  
• Are You Connecting Content to Commerce?  

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Transcript

[00:00:00] 

[00:00:40] Nadine Dietz: Hello, everyone, we have 2 fabulous guests with us here today. We have. Lisa McKnight, who is the EVP and chief brand officer of Mattel and William White, who is the SVP and chief marketing officer at Walmart.

And we're going to be talking about harmonizing innovation and transformation within legacy brands. But before I bring them on [00:01:00] just a couple of quick notes for you. My name is Nadine Dietz. I am the GM at Marketers that Matter and the EVP at MTM's parent company 24 seven. I'm delighted to be able to share some of these great stories with you almost on a weekly basis.

, and this week we've had 2 so double the fun. , 

and then last, but certainly not least, a big shout out to our partner, the Wall Street Journal, for all of their support all along the way.

So with that, I'd like to invite Lisa and William to join me here on screen.

Hello, William. Hello, 

[00:01:31] Lisa McKnight: Lisa. Hey, there. Hello. Hi, everyone. Hennie Dean. Great to be here. 

[00:01:37] Nadine Dietz: Great to have you here. Welcome. I'm very excited about our session today. We've got some really fun topics to cover and some meaningful topics. So thank you both for joining me. Okay, so, uh, we have a lot to cover. But we always love to start with a little bit about you, your background and your role that you have 

[00:01:55] Lisa McKnight: today.

So Lisa, why don't you kick us off? Okay, , a little bit about my [00:02:00] background. I'll try to make this quick, but I started my career in advertising. I loved that experience, did that for many years and loved getting exposed to all different types of industries. From there, though, I decided to go client side.

And started at the gap and then most recently I've been at Mattel. I've been at Mattel for over 20 years and I'd like to say I've had careers within the career. , I have been in every role from overseeing marketing for North America across our entire portfolio to running our marketing communications team to running the Barbie brand.

And then for the past six years, I've been leading global Barbie brand and our dolls division and two months ago after launching the incredible Barbie movie in partnership with my colleagues and partners at Warner Brothers, I'm now in a newly expanded role as chief brand officer over all of Mattel's brands.

[00:02:51] Nadine Dietz: Amazing. And congratulations, by the way. Thank you. You're welcome. Okay, William, how about 

[00:02:57] William White: you? Yeah, , first of all, so great to be with [00:03:00] you both today. I've got awesome respect for each of you. And so it's an honor to join both of you today. , in my current role, , I'm responsible for customer insights and the full range of marketing strategy, planning and execution.

, and at the highest level. I think about our marketing KPIs, the things that we measure ourselves against as how we're driving demand, how we're building and engaging loyalty with our customers and ultimately how we're strengthening the Walmart brand and the equity that we have. 

I've been at Walmart for three and a half years. Prior to that, I held leadership roles at Target and Coca Cola. Both great iconic brands. But I always like to point out that my first job was as a media planner. At Starcon MediaVest. And I think it was there working across a number of different clients that I realized that I had a passion for getting to understand consumers and their attitudes, their beliefs, their [00:04:00] motivations.

And then how to marry that and connect that with a brand's purpose, values, uh, and equities. And so, and again, I'm very fortunate to have worked on three iconic brands along my career and been able to shape those. And it's been fun. 

[00:04:18] Nadine Dietz: Amazing. And thanks for sharing that. It's a perfect segue into what I'd love to talk about next, which is about brand purpose, because we can't talk about harmonizing innovation and transformation within legacy brands without understanding the purpose and the DNA of the brands.

So, I'm gonna come back to you, William, to continue the story around purpose, but Lisa, let's start with you. Obviously, the Barbie movie was huge this year. Very connected in with purpose. Um, but you also cover a lot of other brands at Mattel. Do you want to talk a little bit about brand purpose and how you think about that as chief brand 

[00:04:53] Lisa McKnight: officer of Mattel?

Absolutely. Um, you know, driving purpose throughout our brands and our portfolio is [00:05:00] critical to what we do. And while Mattel itself isn't a broadly known consumer facing brand, we're actually working on that. Even Mattel, , has a purpose, which is to empower, the next generation, to explore the wonder of childhood.

But within that, we have many brands, Barbie, is very top of mind right now. And, and Barbie's purpose is to inspire the limitless potential in every girl. Fisher Price is another very important flagship brand of ours. And that's all about giving kids the best start in life. And I could go on and on.

So each of our brands has, um, a purpose. Purpose and a mission behind it. Um, it's really important to us to make sure that we're connecting to our consumers emotionally, and they have an appreciation for why you know our brands matter. we have a playbook at Mattel and, um, leaning into purpose as well as connecting to culture, driving, um, consumer centric innovation and having a franchise mindset are all the key tenets of how we approach brand management.[00:06:00] 

[00:06:01] Nadine Dietz: Amazing. Wow. I'd love to read that handbook one day. William, I mean, amazing amount of people that are under this umbrella of purpose that you serve, including such a huge employee base. Uh, do you want to talk a little bit about Walmart's purpose and how that's your lighthouse? 

[00:06:18] William White: Absolutely. So I'll start by saying that, um, Sam Walton received the presidential medal of freedom in 1992.

Thank you. And when he, in his acceptance speech, he made a statement saying that we'll give the world an opportunity to save and have a better life. And I think that, that Um, ultimately has been a real lighthouse for the organization, but also, as you mentioned, for in the vast number of associates who come to work at Walmart.

And I think many are drawn to this purpose of save money and live better. Uh, [00:07:00] and that's, and they want to be a part of that in the three and a half years that I've been at Walmart, I'd say that save money, live better. Has been incredibly relevant when you think about the pandemic to inflation to all the things in between that has been a driving force for us and something that I think has been important to, um, for our associates to be a part of, but also for, um, the communities that we serve.

And I think that serving communities has been a part of the Walmart DNA since. Um, as a, as a company we have, and I think we'll continue to respond to whatever the challenges are that our customers are facing. So socioeconomic, environmental, healthcare, you name it. And, um, and that, that is a lighthouse for us.

I would say, I don't think that historically we've always told. Our story, uh, and I think that for emerging [00:08:00] new customers, our future customers, younger generations, it's even more important, uh, younger customers are of course, digitally native. They're always on, uh, they make purchase decisions based on personal affinity that they have for brands and they expect companies to share their And, you know, I think that telling the why behind Walmart is.

As important as ever, maybe more so than telling the what we sell. Um, and I think living that purpose, comes through across all parts of the organization, but particularly a role to play and how we tell that story in marketing. 

[00:08:39] Nadine Dietz: Yeah, yeah, I couldn't agree more in terms of the environment we've all been facing for the last 3 years and how important it is for everyone today.

Um, especially the younger generation. Um, and as you mentioned, they are very. Uh, every last minute when I say this word innovative, I don't know why I say it that way, but I just do. I [00:09:00] don't know if it's my UK upbringing or what, but they are very innovative, but so are a lot of other people. And when you think about how many people you serve, William, in different various levels of sophistication on technology, how do you think about innovation with such a broad scope to serve?

[00:09:21] William White: I think that today, Walmart is equal parts Norman Rockwell and NASA. And I mean, we do have And every day Americana heritage and history and humanity to who we are. And yet, also throughout our entire business, we've got a very deep technology and innovation agenda. I mean, that spans from supply chain to marketing and everything in between.

And there is a balance on how you. Bringing to life Norman Rockwell and NASA. Um, [00:10:00] but the guide for us really does lie in our DNA and Sam Walton was a disruptor, he was an innovator. The whole premise of, of Walmart was to bring. Uh, the assortment found in big cities to rural communities, uh, at affordable prices, and that was new and innovative at the time.

And over the decades, he continued to disrupt himself with different formats and, you know, different ways of bringing the business to life in all of that was in service of the customer. And, and how to serve the customer better. And so when we think about innovation today, it's not innovation for innovation sake.

It really is on behalf of today's customer, but tomorrow's customer as well. And how do we serve them better? Um, and I think, I think that's the guide for us and how we bring it to [00:11:00] life and how we have that balance. Yeah, 

[00:11:03] Nadine Dietz: absolutely. Um, okay, Lisa, how about you? I mean, every day you're dealing with brand new consumers that come into the world.

So how do you think about bringing them along? And is there a lifespan? Obviously, you've proven in the summer, Barbie's for everyone at any age now. But how do you think about innovation and all the different folks that you serve along the way? 

[00:11:25] Lisa McKnight: Well, innovation. You're right. Is at the core of what we do at Mattel?

Um, it's a central part of the playbook that I mentioned. Um, and it's got the consumer at the center. You know, we are at our best when we're connecting to consumers and when we're connecting to culture. And I'll use Barbie as an example. You know, over 10 years ago, we had lost our footing with Barbie. Not only were our sales declining, but More alarmingly, when we spoke to parents that grew up playing with Barbie when they were younger and had an affinity to Barbie, we heard from them that they had no longer.

They no longer saw Barbie as a positive role model. [00:12:00] Um, they didn't know what she stood for and, um, what was really upsetting to us was they were. Um, even acknowledging that they didn't feel good about giving Barbie as a birthday present to some of their, you know, kids friends, uh, you know, for their party.

So that is a bad reflection of social currency. And we knew we needed to rapidly evolve and modernize Barbie to make her. Connected back to culture. Uh, we did a lot of work on the actual doll itself. We modernized her. We introduced new body types, new diversity, um, 100 different skin tones and eye colors and hair fibers.

And Barbie now comes in over 175 different expressions, which is amazing. And it's today the most diverse doll line in the world. But we also knew that we needed to connect to culture with important conversations around impact and female empowerment. And so all of that work that we did is what allowed us, I believe, to have this [00:13:00] breakout movie, of course, in partnership with the genius Greta Gerwig, Margot Robbie, and the Warner Brothers team.

If we hadn't done that foundational work to ground her in purpose, to make her culturally relevant, you know, they would not have wanted to have partnered with us. So I'm really proud about that. But today, what's exciting is, you know, we are not standing still. We're already working on the what's next. Um, you know, we, we have to follow where our consumers are going and we do connect with kids.

We connect to their parents, we connect to fans, and we're starting to think about this broader universe, uh, you know, beyond just our core kid audience, which is really exciting for us as we think about, you know, future growth streams. Amazing. 

[00:13:43] William White: Well, I just, I just want to jump in on that. I, um, had a great opportunity to be with Lisa at the Mattel Innovation Studio, uh, last month, uh, maybe a month into the day.

Yeah. And talking about, you know, as she mentioned, the, all the different [00:14:00] skin tones and eye colors and hair fibers, seeing how they do the hair, like how they're just prototyping and building all of the different hair. Within the dolls is unbelievable. I mean, I was mesmerized watching, um, you know, as, as it was all coming to life to build, build some of these prototypes and different, you know, hair textures and things like that.

It's, um, it's remarkable. 

[00:14:25] Lisa McKnight: Thank you. Thank you. William. No, it's, it's, it's so much fun. We take such great pride and there's, there's incredible, um, you know, craftsmanship, uh, that occurs, um, you know, in the design and development. Of our products, which we're really proud of. But again, as I mentioned, you know, for a brand like Barbie to endure, you know, she's about to be 65, um, in the toy industry with the average life cycle of a toy brand is 3 to 5 years is really incredible.

And it is about not standing still. It's about, you know, that continued iteration, evolution and innovation. 

[00:14:59] Nadine Dietz: Absolutely. [00:15:00] And speaking about innovation, we have a question from the audience, which is going to fit in nicely to what we're going to go into next, which is. Let's talk about some of the innovation that you're working on right now.

Specifically, Alex was asking about the innovation in terms of emerging technologies like Web3 and Metaverse, but already there's innovation into some of the things you guys did this together this summer. Um, let's talk, let's tell us a little bit about the kinds of innovation you think about at Walmart and maybe what you're doing with Lisa.

[00:15:28] William White: Sure. So, I mean, as I said earlier, innovation's happening across the company. I think there's so much cool stuff happening within our supply chain right now, uh, specifically within marketing. A lot of the things that we've been doing have been around what I'd say is shortening the distance between inspiration and purchase.

How do we, in the environments where people are spending their time and social platforms and digital environments, um, in the metaverse, how do we. Take moments of [00:16:00] inspiration and quickly have the opportunity to drive a transaction that, you know, isn't disruptive to the experience. And so, you know, we've done hundreds of shoppable live streams across seven platforms and partners.

We're building visual ingredients search where if you, you know, use search through your camera on your phone can take you to ingredients, take you to recipes for that ingredient. Um, We were the first, uh, T commerce partnership with Roku. Um, and then within, um, Web3, I mean, we've Um, we've created virtual experiences within roadblocks.

Um, we're now on spatial, uh, and so, you know, there's a lot happening there. Uh, I think the fun real story to tell here in terms of, you know, how Lisa and I, and our teams have come together has been around something we did in driving inspiration from Barton, Barbie and a transaction, and [00:17:00] I'll kind of set the stage to say that.

For our marketing campaign this year overall has been welcome to your Walmart. And the notion behind that is, uh, we don't just have everything we have your thing. And one of the ideas that our team had early on when we were developing the campaign was while we should, you know, while we drive that forward, let's take some famous friends, um, and get specific about what's in their cart.

And the team came and said, we want to do Becky G for all these reasons. We want to do Patrick Mahomes for all these reasons. And we want to do Barbie. Now, you know, these things take long lead times and I'll tell you, my first reaction was, and this by the way with Barbie, Walmart and Mattel were already planning big activation in store and, you know, everything getting prepped for the movie.

But when I thought about that in the context of doing a Barbie cart, I said, really? Like, [00:18:00] how big is this going to be? And the team, our team, um, said, Oh, it's going to be really big. Like it's going to be really big. And I mean, I think as big as we thought Barbie would be, um, it's still bigger than that. I mean, the cultural phenomenon of the summer.

Um, but what we did was we partnered with Mattel to bring to life, um, what's in Barbie's cart. And it was, um, something that was, uh, from the experience and from all the inspiration that we had around it, one click, you could add all of those items. Um, and it was just remarkable talking about the power of Mattel's creative studios to build, you know, Barbie size products, like her OPI nail polish, her fanny pack, pickleball paddles, the reusable Walmart bag that she had all these fun things and.

We launched it in a never been done before integration on Good Morning America, where Barbie was on Good Morning [00:19:00] America, uh, talking about all the, you know, her summer and the great summer that she was having and all the things that she, um, she got from Walmart, uh, to have, uh, incredible summer. And so, um, it was such a fun.

bit of, of culture and being a part of that. And I think just beyond our wildest dreams, like captured the, the, uh, the zeitgeist of the moment. Um, and we saw a great performance of it. You know, like all the carts, all the famous carts that we did were great, but this one had tremendous, uh, energy, engagement and purchases coming off of it.

Amazing. 

[00:19:40] Lisa McKnight: That was so much fun, William. The team loved working on this project with you and your team. And I do want to, of course, I've got to give a shout out. I mean, the partnership between Mattel and Walmart is truly best in class. Um, you know, you are so valued as strategic thought partners. And again, I love what we've done together and what's to [00:20:00] come, but to allow us to participate, to invite Barbie.

As a celebrity influencer, um, into this campaign and to share, um, Barbie's Walmart, um, and, and her sort of top picks in product was so much fun. And, and that's what we've been experiencing, um, with Barbie is that, you know, she's more than a doll. She is a cultural icon. She is an influencer. She's got something to say.

And, uh, it sounds like again, from, from your guys reporting that, uh, her pink carpet. Cart was one of the best performing cards in terms of conversion. Uh, and anyway, it was, it was a ton of fun. So thank you for, for thinking of us. 

[00:20:45] Nadine Dietz: And Lisa, we have a visual here. I mean, it, this is so bright and beautiful.

I'm just going to splash a visual. You can tell me what we're looking at 

[00:20:53] Lisa McKnight: here. So we, yeah, so these, these are just some screenshots, but we [00:21:00] created a really fun, you know, stop motion video. And, and, uh, of course, Barbie has to play pickleball because, you know, again, she's, she's very current and pickleball's the thing right now.

But yes, as William said, the team had so much fun miniaturizing these, you know, kind of everyday items. Uh, so again, just tons of fun and great partnership and, uh, you know, again, a great disruptive, uh, marketing program. Yeah, 

[00:21:28] Nadine Dietz: amazing. Tell us a little bit more, Lisa, on some of the other things that you're working on.

Because I know you're always pushing the envelope with how you think about 

[00:21:36] Lisa McKnight: innovation. Well, absolutely. As I've said, you know, we are always, um, studying the consumer. We actually, you know, study the consumer almost 365 days a year, looking where they're going. We are doing a lot in the digital space. We are looking at all of our brands as IP and thinking about storytelling and expansion into new experiences and [00:22:00] new connection points to consumers, um, and having a lot of fun with that.

We are continuing to innovate within play experiences. We've got a great lineup of top toys as we head into the holiday season. And, of course, as you can imagine, we're already working on our 25 product lines. So, continuing to study trends, see what's going on in the marketplace, and make sure we're connecting to culture so we're relevant.

And, um, iterating and innovating within these amazing legacy brands. 

[00:22:29] Nadine Dietz: Amazing. Okay, as we go into the last question from me, I just want to remind the folks that have tuned in today, if you have any questions for William or Lisa, this is the last chance to get them in. Um, but I have a very big question for you guys, which is always our most popular question.

And that is around career advice. So I would love to know along the way, as you both have accomplished so much in your careers, what was one or two or even three [00:23:00] of the top career tips you heard or that you've shared along the way? William, why don't we start with you? 

[00:23:06] William White: Um, one thing that I, I love to share people who know me know, um, I'm a big runner.

And so I, I do sometimes make analogies to, to running in career, but. Um, when you train, so I just ran a marathon recently. And when you think when you train for a marathon, uh, it's a 16 to 18 week training plan, and often, you know, you want, you think about the outcome you think about, you know, I want to run this and I want to run this time and focusing there, isn't the place to focus the focus really happens on all of the little things over the 16 to 18 week cycle leading up to it.

And I think. Similarly with career, what I find with a lot of young people is they have a goal in mind of they want such and such title by such and such [00:24:00] date. at such and such company. And I think that's awesome to have a goal like that. Um, but it's the little things in the work more in the day in and day out that are going to get you there.

And so only focusing on the outcome is, is, is going to be a problem. You really need to focus on the inputs and. To concern yourself with what are the competencies? What are the capabilities that I'm building that are part of, you know, my toolkit? Um, and a lot of that happens on the job. And so thinking about in your current role, um, how are you continuing to learn, uh, along the way?

And I think that learning journey and being really curious about how do I improve my own capabilities and competencies, uh, ultimately is going to lead to the outputs that you want. And so being input focused [00:25:00] rather than output focused is, uh, the advice that, that I like to give. So I love that advice, 

[00:25:06] Nadine Dietz: William.

And, um, It's it's such important advice. I just need to pause on it for a moment because in one of our CMO marketing boards, the question was posed earlier this year. How do we co create a future with Gen Z? Because so much has changed in the workplace and, um, there is a level of expectation that isn't unlike maybe where we started in our careers.

Um, it's natural to want to evolve and get promoted. But what we found in doing some research is. The impact of the same thing that was the impact towards your brand purpose earlier, the last 3 years have been so unsettling that's very often. They don't know where to go to get that kind of input in that advice and the middle managers along the way who were individual contributors pre [00:26:00] pandemic, all of a sudden, assuming leadership responsibilities.

It's hard for them to manage up down, have access know how to help those. Those younger folks know how to ask the right questions. Um, so I think it's really important that there is an awareness that's built about competencies. And so I'm glad you brought that as a, as a recommendation because I couldn't agree more.

The next question is, where do they go to get it? Right? How do they really understand, um, what it takes? We're actually going to be producing, um, in the next couple of weeks, we'll be launching a solution guide based on a lot of input from a lot of great people. That's great. Yeah. Thank you, Lisa. How about you?

You get to wrap us up with the final piece of great career advice. 

[00:26:45] Lisa McKnight: Well, it's interesting. I've been reflecting a lot, um, on, uh, my leadership. Style and, um, and so forth, as I entered into this new role as chief brand officer, I'm sort of 90 days in. And, you know, again, for me, it came down to [00:27:00] one fundamental mission, which is to build trust with my new extended team.

Trust is everything. It takes time to earn. But it is so important. And again, at a company like Mattel that is matrixed, um, you know, building these coalitions with, with different teams is critical. I've, I've been traveling, um, to different campuses, um, you know, over the past three months, connecting with people, listening.

Um, you know, certainly more than speaking, but certainly sharing about myself and then, um, trying to get to know as many different people and levels of talent as I can in the organization to build that trust. I've been most successful throughout my career. Also, when I, um, bring partners in and colleagues in and treat them as stakeholders, you know, I mentioned the Barbie turnaround over 10 years ago, I made that a global initiative for the company, um, you know, This was not something that was isolated to [00:28:00] our global brand team based in Los Angeles.

I, I invited my head of Latin America, EMEA, et cetera, to join me as stakeholders and to share the wins, to share the journey together. And I used a rallying cry. We are Barbie. You know, this is not one individual. This is not one team. This is cross functional. This is the collective we, um, and, and that I think also was really galvanizing to people.

And then the last piece of advice I would share is, you know, to sort of go back to how we opened today's discussion around purpose. I think people, especially this younger generation, they want to do things that matter. They want to believe they want to have purpose. in their daily lives. So to show them why what they're doing matters can be incredibly inspiring and can get you through the good times but also the low times.

Absolutely. Excellent 

[00:28:58] Nadine Dietz: advice. And, um, [00:29:00] in the audience, 

[00:29:00] Lisa McKnight: Aaron, I hope that actually answered your question 

[00:29:02] Nadine Dietz: because your question, I think Lisa just answered, which was how do you have lessons for partnering with product teams and other teams to inspire innovation across the organization? So I think Lisa, you already summed that perfectly, but William, did you want to add anything to that before we close out?

[00:29:16] William White: In terms of, in terms of partnering across the Yes, yeah, I think that, um, in general, I always say, uh, the more you add value, the more you're going to be invited to the table. Uh, and when I think about big matrix organizations. Um, you know, everyone wants to have a seat at the table, and I think the best way to have a seat at the table is to add a lot of value, be a strategic thought partner, um, you know, work towards the shared aligned goals, of course, you know, that, that really is the starting point of ensuring that, you know, all parts of the org are in alignment of what they're setting out to do, uh, and, you know, be Really active in a [00:30:00] participant and driving that for, uh, and I think that, you know, as an individual, the more you do that, the more people are going to want you there.

[00:30:09] Nadine Dietz: Wonderful well, I cannot thank you both so much for being here with us today for sharing all your wonderful insights, innovation, purpose and career advice. . And thank you all for joining us. Yeah, 

[00:30:22] William White: so 

[00:30:22] Lisa McKnight: great to see you. It was a pleasure.

Great to join you all. 

[00:30:25] Nadine Dietz: And we'll see you again soon. Hopefully. . Have a wonderful day, everyone.