The Nordy Pod Turns One

A little over a year ago, we launched our first-ever podcast, The Nordy Pod. Over the past 30 episodes, Nordstrom President, Chief Brand Officer and host of the show Pete Nordstrom has spoken to some fascinating guests — Nordstrom employees, our valued customers, GOAT-level athletes, Grammy-winning musicians, iconic entrepreneurs and more.

We took a trip down memory lane and rounded up some of our favorite quotes and moments from one year of the pod. From Macklemore giving a behind-the-scenes look at the “Thrift Shop” music video to Steve Madden talking about his first shoe design, there are so many great stories to catch up on.

Also, in case you missed it, Women’s Wear Daily wrote a story about the first year of The Nordy Pod, which includes some great quotes from Pete. Check it all out below.

Episode 7: Jessica Alba, actor and founder of The Honest Company, talks about her personal journey to create clean, sustainable baby and beauty products that help people and our planet.

• “When I went and lobbied on Capitol Hill, I would sit down with different people in government that sat on both sides – because this isn’t about Republican or Democrat. This is human health. This is just common sense. We should test chemicals for safety before we bring them into the marketplace.” – Jessica Alba

Episode 12: Aurora James and Emma Grede, founder and chairwoman, respectively, of the Fifteen Percent Pledge, sit down with Pete. They discuss their organization’s mission to challenge retailers to dedicate 15 percent of their shelf space to Black-owned businesses.

• “So far, through our contractual commitments, we’re moving over $10 billion to Black-owned businesses across this country, which is pretty monumental. It’s actually the single largest driver for Black American entrepreneurs that the country has ever seen.”  – Aurora James

Episode 14: Craig Trounce, a former Nordstrom salesperson, tells the famous story about when he helped a customer return a pair of used tires. Robert Spector, author of a series of books called The Nordstrom Way, also sits down with Pete to share his perspective on the legendary “Tire Story.”

• “My grandmother from Germany had a saying — how you holler in the woods is how it echoes back. And I’ve always carried that with me throughout my life.” – Craig Trounce

Episode 17: Steve Madden, design chief of Steve Madden, talks about the evolution of his business, the challenges he’s overcome and the many lessons he’s learned in his storied career.

• “The reason that I have such a great business today was because I was forced to let go and hire a lot of great people — because, you know, I was a one-man band. And so I realized that if I was going away, I better have a deeper company. I was forced to have these great people, and there’s no way you can get big without a great team.” – Steve Madden

Episode 20: Sue Bird, retired WNBA player for the Seattle Storm, discusses her upbringing, her development into a leader, equity and investment opportunities in women’s sports, her pursuits after the WNBA and the parallels between fashion and life.

• “Clothing to me is just another way to showcase who you are and the different sizes of your personality. There are times where you just want to be comfortable, right? And then there are times where you want to push the envelope a little bit and try something new. And that can be scary, but that’s how you find out. Think about life. If you don’t get out of your comfort zone and go try something new, you’re never going to really learn about yourself. And clothing is the same way.” – Sue Bird

Episode 21: Pete digs into our listener mailbag to highlight a few of our favorite customer and employee stories — stories that could only happen here at Nordstrom.

• “The whole Nordstrom experience has made me what I am today. I go out of my way to help my clients. But I loved it. The thing about it — I loved the people, I loved the managers, the management team. And I made some amazing friends.” – Maury Eskenazi, former Nordstrom salesperson

Episode 24: To kick off the holiday season, Pete connects with a few of the many Nordstrom employees that bring the holiday magic to our stores. He's even visited by a special guest from the North Pole.

• “We work closely with visual to erect Santa Lane, and that operation is handled by the Store 1 team — our downtown Seattle store. Thousands of customers will go through Santa Lane this year and get their pictures taken with Santa, which will be amazing.” – Jin Churchill, Director of Event Marketing

Episode 26: Macklemore, the Grammy award-winning artist behind hits like “Thrift Shop” and “Same Love,” talks about his homegrown approach to music production, his golf apparel brand Bogey Boys and more.

• “Golf used to be exciting. Golf used to be a place where people could be originals, or they could be creative, where their personalities flared out there on the course. It has become, people are just walking billboards for corporations and insurance companies, and it’s grey and khaki and navy and repeat. There was a lane to be filled, and I saw it right away.” – Macklemore

Episode 27: Pete is joined by Gucci Westman and David Neville, founders of Westman Atelier, a beauty company committed to making luxury products with clean, ethically sourced ingredients.

• “We don’t allow a lot of ingredients within our formulas, so that creates a whole other layer of complexity and added time, so we customize all of our formulas, all of our packaging. The entire supply chain is overseen so we don’t accept ingredients that don’t have the highest RSPO certificate, which is certification that’s recognized in terms of, is it ethical? Are children sourcing something? We never agree to do anything that doesn’t have the highest compliancy.” – Gucci Westman

Episode 28: Taking the stage at the National Retail Federation’s annual Big Show, Pete sits down with Domenico De Sole, chairman of Tom Ford International, to talk about his career path, his work with iconic designers, and the lessons he’s learned along the way.

• “[Tom and I] got along great together, and we struck a very unique balance between art and commerce. And I was very blessed — first of all, Tom is a real genius, but also, Tom is a very intelligent businessperson. He has a very good business mind. So I think we were really able to balance the art with the commerce, and it was a huge success.” – Domenico De Sole

Episode 29: Pete sits down with Dr. Sperring, CEO of Seattle Children’s Hospital, for a unique episode centered around an organization that’s impacted many people’s lives — including Pete’s.

• “As an organization, you show your integrity—you show your level of trust—by being open about issues, owning them, and then making changes to fix them and get it right.” – Dr. Jeff Sperring

Episode 30: Pete visits two crucial facilities in Iowa — our fulfillment center in Cedar Rapids and our distribution center in Dubuque — where he connects with a few of our critical supply chain experts who make our business possible.

• “Supply chain is the ultimate team sport, and I come from a sports background. I just love that we win as a team; we lose as a team. And when we do lose as a team, we learn from that, and we do things differently to try to win next time.” – Jason Bell, SVP of Supply Chain Operations