A Retail Playbook for How the Small Can Survive the Age of Amazon

When Randy Komisar walks around his house, he sees the future of retail quite clearly. Komisar, a partner at venture capital giant Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, says about two-thirds of the objects in his house are commodity products: paper towels, socks, toothpaste, and a whole pile of other things that can be bought at Wal-Mart Stores or on Amazon.com. The remaining third of his stuff is more distinctive and harder to procure: high-end cowboy boots, custom-made bicycles, New Belgium beer. That slim, specialized slice of commerce is arguably the best place to cultivate a retail company these days.

Turning out a noncommodity product is the only antidote to the economies of scale powering the modern retail behemoths. That’s the thesis behind Komisar’s new book, I F**king Love That Company, co-written with Bayard Winthrop, founder of American Giant, an e-commerce company focused on making the world’s greatest sweatshirt.

The sweatshirt startup is a paragon of Komisar’s world view. American Giant makes one really great product, a proposition that can resonates with consumers while carrying other distinct advantages. Without spending much on marketing and real estate, Winthrop’s company has been flooded with more orders since its 2012 founding than can easily be met.