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Thomas Paulson

Thomas Paulson

Thomas has been Head of Market Insights for Advan Research  since January 2025. Previously, he served as Director of Research and Business Development at Placer.ai, where he was instrumental in providing actionable insights derived from location analytics and the path for expansion into new verticals. His extensive background also includes two decades as a Wall Street analyst and portfolio manager in asset management at AllianceBernstein, Cornerstone, and others.
Wayfair’s Store Shopper – Idiosyncratic and more affluent than IKEA

Wayfair’s Store Shopper – Idiosyncratic and more affluent than IKEA

As of late, we’ve been writing about the improving demand for housing-related retail , with the trend up after being in the dumps since 2022. We also see evidence of that improvement in the building confidence of the management teams of the related principal retailers in to the form of increased capital outlays– **Lowe’s **acquisitions of sheet rock distributor Foundation Building Materials and Artisan Design Group, and Home Depot’s $24B acquisitions of SRS and GMS.
4 minutes
Casey’s Strong Showing and Circle K Turning – more risk to growth ahead for QSR

Casey’s Strong Showing and Circle K Turning – more risk to growth ahead for QSR

Following our note on **7-Eleven **and its new store prototype and potential to improve its inside-the-store contribution to sales, in addition to our story about drive-through coffee and QSR, here we touch on the strong Q2 results from **Casey’s General Store **and the improving trend for Circle K (Alimentation Couche-Tard). Casey’s CEO Darren Rebelez, “We saw positive traffic growth as guests responded well to our innovation and promotional activity in the prepared food and dispensed beverage category.
4 minutes
Warehouse Clubs – Extended store hours leading to more traffic and volume  or is it more inflation fears / avoidance

Warehouse Clubs – Extended store hours leading to more traffic and volume or is it more inflation fears / avoidance

Lots of change in the wholesale club arena as we’ve been writing about , the accelerating pace of expansion, the accelerating embrace of multichannel, proof of membership at the door, scan & go, and more. Longer store hours is the latest change. In May, Sam’s opened its cafes an hour earlier. Club hours are now 10-8 for all members. At the end of June, Costco began opening its doors earlier (9:00 AM) to Executive Members, and extended closing time by an hour on Saturdays.
3 minutes
The Wizard of Oz at the Sphere – Breakout weekend box office total of $9M

The Wizard of Oz at the Sphere – Breakout weekend box office total of $9M

A retooled Wizard of Oz at Sphere in Las Vegas did around $9.3M in box office receipts for the last Thursday – Sunday period; it’s second weekend. We base the estimate on observed visits of 46K for the four-day period and a seat price of $200 per showing. There are two showings Monday – Thursday and four on Saturday and Sunday. This second weekend benefited from all of the positive buzz after the opening weekend.
2 minutes
Starbucks – 1 year in with Brian Niccol

Starbucks – 1 year in with Brian Niccol

One year ago, Brian Niccol stepped into the CEO role at Starbucks, pledging to return the company “back to Starbucks” with a particular focus on reclaiming the 3rd Place through making the locations less busy (imagine that), better serviced, better maintained, and comfy. The wage ($500M) and location remodel investments ($150K each) are substantial. The location makeovers (1000) include sound insulation, rugs, dimmer lighting, more seating, more charging points, cozy dark wood paneling, and more.
3 minutes
Back-to-school means the end of the theme park season: for the smaller guys it was a bust

Back-to-school means the end of the theme park season: for the smaller guys it was a bust

Well for the non-Disney-s and -Universals of theme parks, the season ended on a soft note. Disney’s marketing machine and the new Universal Epic Universe park had just too much of a pull. Separately, given our “thrifty K-shaped consumer-economy” cruise as a better value continues to take market share (third season in a row). The way we track market share is shown in the table. Personal Consumption Expenditures on “Fun” has outpaced Amusement Parks + Camping spending each month of the summer.
3 minutes
The Advan Buysider Issue 5

The Advan Buysider Issue 5

The fifth issue of The Advan Buysider is now available, featuring updates to the names from previous issues such as AMZN, CHWY, TSLA, GWW, FAST, EXP, MLM, HRL, WM, RSG, SHW, TKR, along with new themes on MDT, ETN, JCI, IR, and PH . As a reminder, The Buysider is designed to provide timely, novel, and impactful insights on specific names and topics using Advan’s data. Download Issue # 5 Watch the webinar
One minute
Consumer Insights from Wall Street’s Back-to-School Conference + Foot Traffic

Consumer Insights from Wall Street’s Back-to-School Conference + Foot Traffic

Like the seasons, in the “investor world” following Labor Day, each year brings two dueling must-attend investor conferences, the Barclays’ Back to School Conference and Goldman’s Global Retailing Conference. The conferences are really not about the webcasted presentations; it’s the management 1:1 time that draws in hundreds of buysiders to each event. How a buyside investor chooses is typically determined by the “weight of their book.” (In the future, maybe this provides another opportunity for “digital twins.
9 minutes
Does House of Sport have a routine to tone up Foot Locker?

Does House of Sport have a routine to tone up Foot Locker?

Lots going on in the sneaker space with Dick’s Sporting Goods set to close on Foot Locker on September 8th and fiscal quarter results showing sequential improvement for the major retailers (save WSS which is weighted to the low- to moderate-Hispanic consumer). Part of the better sales is lift was due to the broadly strong back-to-school season that we’ve been reporting on, the other part of it is tariff cost pass-through are driving comp-ticket; average transaction increased +4.
5 minutes
The improving consumer trend broadens to off-price, not trade-down, just a stronger spending

The improving consumer trend broadens to off-price, not trade-down, just a stronger spending

Fiscal Q2 results showed a markedly better pace of sales for off-price, led by Burlington (as we had previewed ). The gains were on a 1-, 2-, and 3- year basis as the table below demonstrates. Additionally, off-price’s acceleration wasn’t to the detriment of legacy department stores. If off-price was experiencing a big trade-down benefit, it would hit legacy department stores hard given that the three are 50% larger, in aggregate, than the legacy names.
5 minutes