Julia Babina

Julia Babina, Vice President of Operations and Customer Service, Brooklinen

This episode of Women in Retail Talks features an interview originally conducted by Women in Retail Leadership Circle’s sister brand, Total Retail, for the Total Retail Talks podcast. In the episode, Total Retail’s Executive Editor Joe Keenan interviews Julia Babina, vice president of operations and customer service at Brooklinen, a direct-to-consumer brand selling luxury bed sheets, pillows, comforters and blankets. Listen in as Babina discusses the story of Brooklinen’s growth to becoming the largest bedding brand in the D-to-C space, the opening of its first pop-up shop in New York last year, and why the brand decided to experiment with a pop-up. Brooklinen’s pop-up shop brought operational challenges for the startup, and Babina explains that the critical challenges centered around timing, systems, and people management. She shares how the brand tracked customers coming into the pop-up shop, and how Brooklinen continued communications and developed relationships with those customers after the pop-up shop had closed. Babina discusses how the company managed inventory for the four-week event and the results the bedding brand is most proud of following the pop-up experiment. Lastly, Babina shares Brooklinen’s plan to analyze customer feedback and data to validate future physical retail expansion.

Julia Babina is an energetic, dynamic and progressive business operations professional who has been instrumental in defining, shaping and planning operational initiatives. Recognized as a strong communicator, she’s adaptable and resourceful, with a cooperative and knowledgeable approach in meeting business operational objectives. Blended experience throughout her career includes order fulfillment, logistics, organic cosmetics production, ingredient and packaging sourcing, bookkeeping, sales, and e-commerce. Before joining Brooklinen, Babina held operational roles at Ruby Has Fulfillment and Dizao Organics. She’s from Dneprodzerzhynsk, Ukraine and received her M.A. in International Relations from Kiev International Institute for the Humanities.

Date: September 17, 2019