Ideas in the Wild: How Mark Kinsley and Mark Quinn Are Helping Retailers Deal with COVID and Industry Disruption

What does it take for today’s independent retailers to survive and thrive?

Retail is experiencing a massive transition. Thousands of independent retailers have been bobbing in the ocean, clinging to planks of splintered wood and struggling to stay afloat.

Today, those who remain have washed ashore on a new island, and the rules have changed. But where there’s life, there’s hope, as long as retailers are willing to roll up their sleeves and do the work. In Come Back to Bed, Mark Kinsley and Mark Quinn offer strategies and principles retailers can use to forge lasting customer relationships that will weather any storm.

I recently caught up with both Marks—also the hosts of the Dos Marcos Podcast—to learn what inspired them to write the book and their favorite ideas they share with readers.

What happened that made you decide to write the book? What was the exact moment when you realized these ideas needed to get out there?

It was during the COVID shutdown that we realized we had the gift of time and an opportunity to do something meaningful. We also realized there would be a lot of independent retailers that were going to be struggling as a result of the shutdown. So, we wanted to do something that would help people come out of that—not only survive it, but thrive amidst what’s to come.

As we continue to hear independent retailers talk to us about big box and e-commerce taking up their market share, that was definitely an inspiration for us because we see these retailers have an incredible opportunity. The only problem? Many of them don’t realize the opportunities they actually have. We wrote the book because it could help open those doors for them.

What’s your favorite specific, actionable idea in the book?

The first one is making a decision—deciding to do it differently because it really all starts with that. You have to look at your business and accept the fact that there is more opportunity for you. You also have to accept that doing things the same way you’ve always done them will get you the same result. So, that one basic idea is a cornerstone of what we’re doing here.

We also love the HATCH method, which is our creative thinking process. So much of what we talk about in the book depends on creative thinking, so we actually bring that concept into the fold and show people that this is a skill you can learn and use in your own business.

What’s a story of how you’ve applied this lesson in your own life? What has this lesson done for you?

Here’s a great example from our own careers: when innerspring mattresses were losing market share to specialty foam suppliers, we had to figure out a way to reverse that trend. Innersprings needed to be “the cool kid” again. People were convinced springs were squeaky old technology, so we couldn’t say they were better. We had to change the conversation.

Inspiration came from a golf tournament Mark Quinn saw. He remembered commercials about hybrid golf clubs and hybrid cars. That’s when we jumped in with the HATCH method.

For years, mattresses had been made with both springs and foam. It wasn’t an either/or proposition. Together springs and foam were better. Together they were a hybrid. That language was familiar to consumers, and we thought people would understand it.

Nobody else was using the term hybrid, so we created our own category. The language freshened things up and gave bedding producers and retailers a new way to talk about the latest sleep technology. The question was, how do we get an entire industry to adopt our new way of thinking? Naturally, we decided to make a rap video.

One year after the campaign launched, Sealy aired a national television ad with a product called the Sealy Hybrid, becoming the first major to embrace the new category and validating our strategy. The hybrid mattress was eventually adopted by every major bedding producer, including some of the companies that had been attacking springs for years. Hybrids soon became the fastest-growing and most profitable segment in the industry.

Imagine me going to leadership and asking them to fund a six-figure rap music video about a hybrid mattress—a category that didn’t even exist. Yet I did, they thankfully said yes, and it paid off big. Our business shot up by over 30 percent, bringing millions in profit to the company and to our customers, the bedding producers that jumped on the hybrid train.

Here’s what we’ve learned: you will fail. We all do. But if, over time, you stay true to your strategy, you will succeed. If you want to ignore your problems, there are 1,001 ways to justify inaction, but we know where that leads. Be bold. Take action.