Beyond The Register, with Keenan Kok-Carlson

About Beyond The Register, with Keenan Kok-Carlson

I’m Keenan Kok-Carlson, a lifelong retail operator turned Senior Product Manager at Global Payments. I’ve lived every part of running a store, from opening the doors to fixing the systems that keep it alive. Beyond the Register shares the real stories behind small retail: inventory chaos, hiring struggles, vendor issues, burnout, and the wins that keep owners going. No fluff, just the truth about what it takes to run a shop today. This is Beyond the Register.

Publisher

Beyond The Register

Category

business

Language

en

Explicit

No

First episode

3 Dec 2025

Latest episode

27 Oct 2026

Latest episodes

35 episodes in the feed.

1. 

   27 Oct 2026

   Trick or Treat? Why She Quit Healthcare to Sell Candy In NYC

   At the end of 2025, Cat Cirino kept telling everyone it was an insane time to start a business. Consumers were getting squeezed, SNAP was being cut, and a retail build-out cost about twice what it did a few years earlier. A few months later she was spending close to $45,000 on custom millwork and signing a lease on Fulton Street in Brooklyn. She calls herself personally fiscally conservative. This week Keenan sits down with Cat, founder of Candor, a candy shop in brownstone Brooklyn with 60-some bins of pick and mix and a shelf of gifts you won't find at the bodega. She spent about 15 years in nonprofit, consulting, and healthcare strategy before walking away from all of it. Since opening on March 31, the shop has done goodie bags for Google's fall retreat, worked New York Fashion Week, and filled orders for Etsy and Pinterest, all without a sales team. She ran a three-year pro forma before she ever looked at a space, and she's honest about what made the jump possible for her and what still keeps her up. With Halloween and the NYC Marathon both landing on her block this fall, she's about to find out how many thousands of trick-or-treat bags one candy shop can hand out. In this episode: - The "clickety clack job" crowd, and why so many people with desk jobs secretly want a shop of their own - How choosing not to have kids changed her tolerance for risk - Why she lined up a real estate agent, architect, and designer before signing a lease - What rent abatement actually means, and why she only got three months - Turning a former real estate office into a third space people want to rent for their birthdays - The millennial gray problem, and why the design investment paid off - How giftables took her average ticket from $7 or $8 up to $12 or $13 - The drink-accompaniment shelf that didn't sell the way she hoped - Candy bags going from $0.30 to $0.55, and the $5 card minimum that helps absorb it - Why fancy chocolate is mostly packaging, and why that's the point Subscribe to Beyond the Register for conversations with the owners and operators actually running independent retail. Listen on YouTube, Spotify, and Apple Podcasts. Timestamps: 00:00 Intro 01:12 Leaving healthcare for a candy shop 03:33 The clickety clack job crowd 06:41 Building the three-year pro forma 11:54 How not having kids raised her risk tolerance 16:08 Her order of operations before the lease 18:09 Why a commercial lease is like buying a house 23:39 Designing a third space 27:15 The millennial gray problem 33:16 How giftables raised the average ticket 39:08 The shelf that didn't sell 41:23 Tariffs, oil, and the $0.55 candy bag 46:27 Why candy is really packaging 47:43 Landing Google and Fashion Week 53:40 Where to find Cat Beyond the Register is brought to you by Genius™ (Link globalpayments.com/genius (http://globalpayments.com/genius)) from Global Payments, the retail point of sale system designed to help busy store owners track inventory, manage customers and take payments.

2. 

   20 Oct 2026

   This Is How Boutiques Outlast Big Market Stores

   Christine Alcalay opened her first boutique in 2002 in an unheated shoebox space on Berkeley Place in Brooklyn, and the entire clothing rack fell down on opening day. Twenty-four years later she runs three stores in Park Slope: a women's multi-brand boutique, a men's multi-brand shop, and a boutique for her own label, made in small batches in New York City. She got there by making the moves most owners avoid. When stores on her block were closing, she signed a second lease. When COVID shut her doors, she raised money from neighbors to pay her team and sold her inventory over Instagram. In this episode she explains how a neighborhood boutique outlasts stores that will always win on price, and why she has never wanted to be a cool store. In this episode: - Why she grew while the rest of the block was cutting back, and the one phone call that landed her a second lease - What buying out her business partner of 13 years cost her, financially and mentally - The GoFundMe she ran in April 2020 to take care of her team - Selling a store's worth of inventory through Instagram stories and DMs during shutdown - How she explains a higher price tag to customers who can find something cheaper elsewhere - Buying for specific customers she knows by name, down to the shirt they wore last season - Opening price point items that turn a 16-year-old into a future customer Subscribe to Beyond the Register for conversations with the people who actually run stores. Watch on YouTube, or listen on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Timestamps: 00:00 Intro 01:41 The shoulder seam lesson from her mom 05:31 From an unheated shoebox store to three shops 09:18 Growing while the block was shrinking 13:13 Buying out her partner of 13 years 15:22 The GoFundMe that paid her team 19:51 Selling everything on Instagram during shutdown 22:34 When a store becomes a neighborhood hub 25:05 Competing with stores that win on price 26:32 Explaining the price tag 30:19 Everyone wears many hats 37:20 Buying for a specific customer 41:33 When a customer says it's too expensive 45:57 Opening price points and future customers 47:41 Where to find her Beyond the Register is brought to you by Genius™ (Link globalpayments.com/genius (http://globalpayments.com/genius)) from Global Payments, the retail point of sale system designed to help busy store owners track inventory, manage customers and take payments.

3. 

   13 Oct 2026

   How to Beat Big Box Stores (Without Being Cheaper) | Todd Barancik

   In March 2020, Todd Barancik watched close to 90% of his company's revenue disappear in three business days. His business delivered healthy snacks to offices, and the offices had just emptied out. A year later he was a regular at a tiny zero-waste pop-up in Chicago run by two Broadway actors. When they announced they were closing, he asked his wife what she thought about taking it over. Today The Unwaste Shop has two Chicago locations, and it runs on one of the hardest asks in retail: bring your own container, fill it, and pay by the ounce. Todd is upfront that he can't win on convenience and usually won't win on price, so he competes on how people feel when they walk in. In this episode he explains why every customer gets the same warm welcome no matter who they are, why he barely looks at resumes and hires for character instead, how he answers a customer who says it's cheaper somewhere else, and why a quick photo of a customer's dog can outperform a reel his team spent hours on. In this episode: - Losing close to 90% of his revenue in three days, and what came next - What he checked before buying a business in an industry he'd never worked in - Why he relaunched the online store from his kitchen table before he had a storefront - How a simple greeting at the door drives the whole business - Why he hires for character and barely looks at resumes - What he says when a customer finds it cheaper somewhere else - Pricing by the ounce so customers buy exactly what they need - How he opened store #2 by handing it to a partner who lives down the street Subscribe to Beyond the Register for conversations with the people who actually run stores. Watch on YouTube, or listen on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Timestamps: 00:00 Intro 01:00 From office snacks to a zero-waste shop 03:51 Losing 90% of revenue in three days 05:13 The pop-up run by two Broadway actors 07:27 What he looked for before taking it over 10:09 The support system behind a new business 12:17 Why shoppers care what goes on their skin 14:17 Starting online from the kitchen table 17:16 Refilling is how things used to be 19:08 Winning on culture instead of convenience 23:01 When it's cheaper somewhere else 30:03 Why people go back to a restaurant with average food 31:57 "I can't teach you character" 34:21 Why he doesn't micromanage 37:03 Knowing what you're not good at 39:41 The dog photo that beat the reel 41:42 Opening store #2 in Beverly 44:57 What's next for The Unwaste Shop 48:30 Practice makes better 49:20 Where to find Todd Beyond the Register is brought to you by Genius™ (Link globalpayments.com/genius (http://globalpayments.com/genius)) from Global Payments, the retail point of sale system designed to help busy store owners track inventory, manage customers and take payments.

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