​By Moe Lastfogel
Director of Sales and Marketing for The Retail Observer

Watch live show events from our digital pages

Welcome to our February Issue. This issue will feature something new for us — we will be hosting the NKBA Design + Industry Awards live, right from the pages of The Retail Observer Digital Version (pages 34-35). We are extremely excited to be able to bring you this industry event live. The February issue will also guide you through some of the other events and features of KBIS 2021.

January brought us another first to cover: Virtual CES 2021. As the largest industry trade show in North America, CTA decided this year to go virtual and report they had a highly successful event. From new robotic kitchens to folding TVs and phones, many new innovations were introduced. More than 2,000 companies participated this year, with AI, 5G, mobility, health and design as key features. We will be showing many of these new products in the months to come.

Over the next few months we will be showing the actual projects from the NKBA Design + Industry Awards. March will feature the Kitchen Award winners, May will highlight the Bath Awards, and the April Issue will be the follow-up for the KBIS Virtual Show. We have three more digital awards slated to be live this year, so stay tuned.

Remember to set the NKBA Design + Industry Awards night event in your calendar and check it out live via The Retail Observer Digital Version on page 34.

Be Safe and Happy Retailing,
Moe Lastfogel
​[email protected]

​By Eliana Barriga
Publisher and Managing Editor for The Retail Observer

I’ve had the pleasure of meeting and getting to know many of you over the years. I know some who are still gung-ho and driven to navigate through the changing times and find new ways to grow their businesses and others who have lost their passion for what they do long ago.

But I say, what’s love got to do with it? Yes, ultimately love for your work is very important to your overall well-being and quality of life. But it’s not the feeling of love that will get you to work 80 plus hours a week to get a new business venture up and running or come up with creative ways to keep it going when sales are low, really low and the industry is bleak. During these times, it’s a choice to continue pushing on through with the understanding that change, one way or the other, is inevitable. But if you remain adaptable, have clear vision, and a plan in place and stick to it, you will eventually find yourself enjoying the benefits of business ownership
and in love with what you do once again.

I’ve found that those who seek to feel in love with their businesses most of the time are the ones who end up broken and defeated. They are now stuck in a rut because they made impulsive choices based on what they loved. Instead, it would have been wise for them to have made smart decisions by ensuring that their plan covered the things that they don’t necessarily like to do or talk about, but are necessary for running a successful business.

This goes for almost everything in our lives that we say we “love” – parenthood, marriage, friendships, health, hobbies, etc. We don’t always have that loving feeling, but we stay committed to these things. We spend time to nurture and work on them, which is why we reap the rewards of what we all call love.

Happy Valentines’ Day!
Eliana Barriga
[email protected]