Kate Ancketill has delivered the headline trends keynote at the National Retail Federation Big Show in New York for ten consecutive years, the industry’s most anticipated stage for identifying what’s next in global retail.

Winner of the 2025 Speaker Awards for Best AI and Future Technology Speaker, and named BizTech Magazine’s Top 30 IT influencers 2024, Kate’s clients have included P&G, Costa Coffee, Kingfisher, Tesco, Sephora, Google, Microsoft, Moet Hennessy, Richemont, Royal Caribbean Cruises, Lego and the BBC. She continuously tracks the headwinds and innovations shaping retail, hospitality, brands and consumer experience, then translates trends into specific commercial implications for clients planning three to five years ahead.

Retail and consumer-facing industries are torn between the complex operational needs of the day to day and immediate profit targets, with the need for longer-term planning in which the economy’s adaptation to AI and automation, changes in Gen Z behaviour, geopolitics, demographics and economic challenges are changing the nature of business.

The world is changing faster than at any time in history. Leaders need to become more like futurists themselves, in order to anticipate and adapt to what’s coming. Kate shares her 25 years of experience in how anyone can do this.

Her talks deliver:

• grounded, business-applicable global insights on trends that matter, no fads
• brand-new case studies demonstrating how brands are adapting successfully to the AI era, delighting their customers and turning a profit
• a three to five year horizon for board and CMO planning (absolutely no blue-sky ten-year crystal ball gazing), and
• a sharper view of Gen Z and Generation Alpha as future customers rather than demographic abstractions

Best for retail-related, consumer goods and hospitality boards making three-to-five-year capital and format decisions, CMOs and customer experience leaders rebuilding brand and CX around AI, innovation and strategy leads inside major consumer brands, and conferences where the audience are not tech professionals but where the agenda is AI-driven.

“Kate gets among the highest feedback for speakers at the NRF Big Show every year – that’s why we’ve invited her to give the trends keynote for 10 years running”.

Martin Reardon, CMO and EVP of Content and Retail Strategy, NRF (former CMO, Macys)

TYPICAL TOPICS KATE SPEAKS ON (all her talks are custom – these are examples)

• The future of consumer-facing AI for retail, brands and experiences – addressing physical and digital commerce, and everything in between.

Synopsis:

We all know our economy, our jobs, the way we search, shop, and explore the world around us is changing faster than most people felt possible. There are going to be winners and losers, adopters and avoiders. Without utopianism, dystopianism or techie jargon, this presentation will explore how consumers are changing in the AI era. What will Gen Z expect from brands and experiences? How should we balance the opportunity for optimised personalisation, empathic customer service and agentic efficiency against the desire for authentic, human creativity and imperfection?

• Age of Transformation: why all leaders need to be futurists, and how others do it.  

Synopsis:

According to Google’s principle researcher and AI visionary, Ray Kurzweil, “We won’t experience 100 years of progress in the 21st century – it will be more like 20,000 years of progress at today’s rate”. Never before in human history have leaders needed to navigate such a fast-changing business landscape. Literally every leader needs to become more future-focussed and adaptive to the AI wave that’s changing our world. As a business futurist for 25 years, Ancketill will demonstrate concrete outputs of future-focussed innovative cultures, and show how others create the conditions for continuous innovation, adaptation and success in this age of exponential change.

• Consumer trends – how will upcoming generations live, work, travel, consume and spend their leisure time? What do businesses need to do to adapt to their changing needs? 

RECENT AND UPCOMING CONFERENCE BOOKINGS

Unitas, (Wholesale) Istanbul, September 2026

Gartner, London, September 2026

RetailTrends Conference, Amsterdam, September 2026

Richemont (Luxury), London, July, 2026

Parmenion (Investment), London, June 2026

Mane (Flavours & Fragrances), Cincinnati, June 2026

Puratos (Bakery Foods), Panama, June & September 2026

The Crown Estate (Board of UK’s sovereign-owned estate), London, May 2026

Mastercard, Zurich, May 2026

D-Congress, Sweden, March 2026

TESTIMONIALS

“I am from Brazil, the leader of one of the delegations, we are the biggest international delegation in NRF and everybody loves to listen to and learn with Kate. She is one of the Best speakers at NRF. We ask to put her on the main stage as a Keynote speaker. Hope that this happens for the next year.”

Lu Carmo luciana@we.tur.br

“Kate is fantastic, brilliant, exceptional!

A great speaker, who researches trends with unique depth and is always concerned with bringing the best and richest content, customized to each target audience”.

Romano Pansera, APAS. romano@eventoria.com.vc

‘A Meeting of Minds’ conference: How is AI changing the world?         

Feedback: Fascinating and scary 9.25/10 (highest of all speakers)

James Goad, Owen James Events. jamesgoad@owenjamesgroup.com

One word kept coming up again and again when attendees were commenting on your session – WOW!

Claire Knott, Conference Director, The Retail Bulletin Conference.

Claire.Knott@theretailbulletin.com

“Kate you were a pure joy to hear from thank you so much for spending the day with us”

Julia Darvill, MD, Puratos 

“It was a fantastic event and the feedback received was incredible. She has been our best speaker to date in terms of interest and questions.”

Fleur Copping, Fujitsu

“Really enjoyed the presentation, my mind is blown! From the scary advances in robots/tech and how reliant we maybe become of them/it to personalised music in-store. Genuinely one of the most interesting presentations I’ve heard in a long time. Please can you sign me up to email updates?” 

Sally Ritchie, Programmatic Operations Executive, ASOS