Rachel Goldstein

Rachel Goldstein has retail in her DNA. Growing up in her family's New York garment business, she learned consumer behavior from the ground up before earning her MBA from Northwestern's Kellogg School of Management. Rachel spent eight years in retail equity research at Morgan Stanley, where she became known for her uncanny ability to spot emerging consumer trends before they hit the mainstream. She correctly predicted the athleisure boom, warned about the department store apocalypse, and identified which e-commerce players would survive the post-pandemic normalization. Rachel combines quantitative analysis—same-store sales, inventory turns, customer acquisition costs—with qualitative insights gleaned from store visits, mystery shopping, and tracking social media sentiment. She's equally comfortable analyzing Walmart's supply chain efficiency and a hot DTC brand's Instagram strategy. Rachel understands that retail success ultimately comes down to product-market fit, operational excellence, and adapting to shifting consumer preferences. Based in Chicago, she's a frequent conference speaker and her analysis influences both institutional investors and retail entrepreneurs seeking to understand the industry's evolution.