Eric Singleton, Chief Information Officer of Chico's, Inc.

Episode Overview

Among other topics, Eric discusses the following issues with Metis Strategy:

• The benefits of drawing from IT experience across different verticals and industries to deliver game-changing solutions to a new sector.
• Eric’s innovation in applying the “customer perspective” to the traditionally internally focused organization of IT, as well as how it has led him to become a more externally-focused and sensitive CIO.
• The comprehensive approach Eric took when developing Chico’s innovative FAS Digital Retail Theater to seamlessly blur the line between the “bricks and clicks.”
• The imperative of “relentless transparency” with the customer when capturing information at the point of sale, both to build trust and communicate enhanced value to the customer experience in a way that sustains the relationship between consumer and brand.
• The ability of the Tech Tables to leverage technology in a way that elicits a natural and memorable social interaction with customers while significantly decreasing inventory carrying costs for Chico’s.
• Eye on Trends: The blurring of lines between the augmented reality digital experience and its spillover into everyday reality, the idea of real life interaction with technology as a continuum that now extends to each moment of the customer lifestyle and the ability of a brand to tap into that connectedness.

Eric Singleton’s Biography

Eric Singleton is the Chief Information Officer of Chico’s Inc., the international women’s retailer with a portfolio of four brands, Chico’s, Boston Proper, Soma Intimates, and White House | Black Market. Eric is considered a leader in the field of omni-channel retailing, a topic we cover in some depth in this interview. Among other responsibilities, Eric oversees information technology within the enterprise, including but not limited to the desktop, IT and information security, and information delivery.

Prior to his tenure at Chico’s, Eric served as the Chief Information Officer for Tommy Hilfiger Corporation where he held worldwide responsibility for the company’s Information Technology division, and as Senior Vice President of Technologies for AOL, Inc., the multinational American mass media corporation. Among many key responsibilities at AOL, Eric led software engineering where he architected and implemented a unified platform for the discovery, trial, purchase and management of AOL’s Paid Services offerings, while also overseeing AOL’s technology roadmap.

Eric holds a Bachelor’s Degree in computer science and business from the University of Central Florida and is a graduate of the Executive Management Marketing Program at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School of Business.

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