In this episode of Retaili$tic, Deborah Weinswig interviews Elias Oxendine, the VP of Cybersecurity at Tractor Supply. They discuss Elias's journey from military intelligence to cybersecurity, the unique challenges of managing cybersecurity in a franchise model, and the rapid evolution of technology in retail. The conversation highlights the importance of communication, trust, and partnerships in navigating the complexities of cybersecurity and retail technology. Elias shares insights on educating employees about cybersecurity and the role of AI in shaping the future of retail.
Video version is here
Takeaways
Elias Oxendine emphasizes the rapid pace at which Tractor Supply operates.
The culture at Tractor Supply encourages learning from failures.
Communication is crucial for cybersecurity professionals to convey technical concepts in business terms.
Trust is essential for maintaining customer relationships in cybersecurity.
Elias's journey from military intelligence to cybersecurity showcases the importance of diverse experiences.
The role of CISO has evolved significantly, especially in a franchise model.
AI is becoming increasingly important in cybersecurity and retail operations.
Employee education on cybersecurity must include safe browsing practices.
Partnerships with technology providers are vital for innovation and success.
The future of retail will be defined by experiential customer interactions.
Chapters
00:00 Introduction to Elias Oxendine and Nashville's Tech Scene
04:14 Understanding Tractor Supply: More Than Just Tractors
07:00 Elias's Journey: From Navy to Cybersecurity
09:48 The Influence of Military Discipline on Professional Life
12:31 Transitioning from GE to Yum: Challenges and Growth
15:26 The Evolving Role of CISO in Today's Digital Landscape
18:13 Navigating AI and Cybersecurity in Modern Business
20:48 Educating Employees on AI Usage and Governance
25:36 Engaging Learning Techniques
27:23 Establishing AI Governance
29:54 Edge Computing in Retail
33:11 Enhancing In-Store Experience
35:29 Cybersecurity and Trust
38:41 Evolving Technology Partnerships
45:13 Lightning Round Insights
Philip Moore (00:00)
Welcome to Retaili$tic, the official podcast of Coresight Research for October 14, 2025. This week CEO Deborah Weinswig welcomes Elias Oxendine. Elias currently leads cybersecurity for Tractor Supply after stints at Yum Brands, General Electric, and U.S. Naval Intelligence.
But before we learn about the latest developments in digital threats, let's check in with Isla for her weekly rundown of the new research coming out this week.
Isla Meldon (00:32)
Next week, we're rolling out a packed lineup of reports and insights to get you ready for the retail season ahead. We'll start with our main US holiday consumer survey, offering a deep dive into shopper expectations and what they mean for retailers this season. We'll also take you around the globe with coverage of China's Golden Week, plus a look ahead to Diwali and Singles Day and what each means for the retail sector.
Along the way, we'll share fresh insights from recent shopping events hosted by Amazon, Target and Walmart. Then we'll shift gears with our modern store checkout capabilities report, exploring how retailers can reduce friction and drive growth in 2025 and beyond. And finally, we'll tackle one of retail's biggest questions, AI. What's possible? What's still theoretical? And what it all really means for the future of retail. Stay tuned. Next week's insights are all about what's coming, what's changing and what's next.
Philip Moore (01:26)
Thanks Isla. Now here's Deborah and Elias.
Deborah Weinswig (01:30)
Elias, thanks so much for joining us today. We're so excited to have you on Retaili$tic with us. And maybe tell us where you are and what you're up to.
Elias Oxendine (01:38)
Yeah, absolutely. So Elias Oxendine and certainly Debra, glad to be here with you this morning, this afternoon. And so excited about these opportunities. And so I am currently residing in Nashville, Tennessee, in which I work for Tractor Supply, in which I am the VP responsible for cybersecurity privacy. And I will just say to a lot more other additional hats in the short time that I've been here. so I've been with the company for about 18 months now. And
Join Tractor, join Nashville. We've been pleasantly surprised at Nashville, quite honestly.
Deborah Weinswig (02:08)
mean, Nashville as a city is changing rapidly. I the amount of events, I would say in the next 12 months that are happening there is really changing, know, is really changing in terms of, I think, the pace. And the city is almost a tech hub is really growing and that must be exciting for you to see.
Elias Oxendine (02:26)
Yeah, absolutely. One of things I'm doing is trying to establish my network here. It's been time I've been here and you're correct. There are a lot of IT professionals doing a lot of good things here in the city of Nashville and quite honestly, it still seems to be attracting even more.
right to the area. And so that is what was been pleasantly surprising to me because before coming to Nashville, I spent the last 18 years in Louisville, Kentucky, right? And so coming here wasn't quite sure what to expect, but at the same time, I think you're correct. It is trending toward that tech hub as we see more companies, you know, their headquarters here, etc. So on, but also to just a number of events, right? And so as I continue to grow my network,
I'm surprised by who all I've been connecting with. I've got the CISO at Bridgestone, I got CISO over at Douglas General, just a number of places in which finding some good camaraderie amongst the technical folks here.
Deborah Weinswig (03:15)
And it's really interesting supply is a bit of an enigma for a lot of people. First of all, just the name of the company. think I remember somebody, know, actually it's been a lot of some days, they're like, they sell tractors. like, not exactly. So, you know, when you first heard about the company and what you first understood, maybe you can take us kind of from that point to what you know and understand today.
Elias Oxendine (03:38)
Yeah, sure. think as I was looking to transition out from Yum, looking for other opportunities and knowing I wanted to leave Louisville.
so I had a number of opportunities that were presented to me, ⁓ tractor. knew a tractor supply, but I did not know it, you know, wasn't a customer and those kinds of things. I will share with you in a short time that I've been here, it is much more than that, Deborah. If you think about in terms of our life out here strategy and what we're really focused on, ⁓ I was like I said, once again, completely surprised. And what really caught me by surprise was the speed and pace in which we move. ⁓ So some reason because it was agriculture, I was thinking it's going to be slow and easy to ease. It is not that we run at an incredible place.
pace. But even from a technological standpoint, tractor is always first through the door, right? We are second and third to none. And it shows up in how we do our projects, how we deliver for the business, for our customers and those things. So the speed and the focus and just the scrappiness in which we operate those kind of things is what I've been surprised with now.
Deborah Weinswig (05:05)
I I'm, in terms of my tenure, being very familiar with the company, I'm on third CEO with Hal. And what's interesting and consistent is the kind of pride in trying something totally new. And it's not even about...
the kind of score you get on the other side, right? Did we win? Did we lose? It's more about we went through the process and what we learned. And I think the fact that it's a learning organization really changes the whole kind of construct. And I think that that, unless you spend time there, that's something that took me a while to understand. And once I did, it helped me understand a lot of the decisions that were made.
Elias Oxendine (05:50)
Yeah, absolutely. It's kind of that, you know, fail forward and fail fast, right? If you will.
And so absolutely correct in terms of that. And so my background where I've been before, whether it be military or GE is very order structure process, right? Control how we go about things. so Tractor's been a unique growth opportunity for me in which I have to change my operating model and just things that really assimilate how Tractor operates. But you are correct. The culture here is one of, let's try it. Let's do it. And so we can learn from it. If we land it, you know, hit a home run, great.
But it is about what we learn in the process and how we continuously get better for the next opportunity and those kinds of things. But yeah, fail forward, but fail fast is how we kind of operate here.
Deborah Weinswig (06:35)
Maybe you kind of harken back to your experience in the Navy. Can you talk about your decision? Because as I was spending time in your background, it's not the typical kind of progress into the Navy. And so it was one of those, I'm like, I'm doing all this research. I'm like, I just have to ask. So maybe if you can share that with our audience.
Elias Oxendine (06:56)
Yeah, you weren't supposed to do all that, Debra, right?
So, yeah, so, you know, 11 years in the Navy as an intelligence officer, right? And so that's really how I got my start, you know, into cyber. My very first aircraft carrier got known for being a guy that was, could use IT to solve a number of problems, right? Just think about Intel and what that means in terms of trying to process information, et cetera, to make it meaningful and valuable data. And that's what ultimately resulted in me attending the Navy's postgraduate school in moderate California, where I got my master's in information technology.
technology management. And I continue to thrive in that space. And I really saw that come to light when I was stationed in Hawaii, and which I was responsible ⁓ for 14 aircraft carriers and amphibious ships, meaning equipping them with the appropriate intelligence systems, classified networks and communications to sustain six months at sea, right, or doing operations and those kinds of things. And so that's how I got my start into cyber.
⁓ Why did I leave the Navy? I had a young family and had a young son. And so when I was working up for my son understood dad's not coming home and made it rough for him, which made it rough for my wife, which made it rough for me. And she's like, you got to find something else different to do.
And I said, yes, ma'am, I got
if you followed my background, you would know, it's like, wait a minute, you went from all that to try to convince mom to buy processed cheese sauce? Yes, I went to work for Kraft Foods as a brand manager for the Cheez Whiz product, but long story short, it just was not for.
Deborah Weinswig (08:25)
Right, actually,
I'm embarrassed to say I think we have three jars in our cupboards. Like, I was not expecting to say that nor was I even gonna...
Elias Oxendine (08:31)
Hahahaha
Okay,
you know what, so wouldn't I would go too loud with that, right? So but
Cheese Whiz, I'll just say it's a good product, it's got a long shelf life. So, having done that, ⁓ I wanted to get back into IT and those kinds of things. And so I was very fortunate to find a way to get back into IT, but landed in Louisville, Kentucky, working for a number of companies there, right? And spent the last 18 years there. But the Navy was a great star for me, enjoyed it. I learned a lot of the concepts and leadership that I apply today in everyday life here, where I've been and even a tractor, right? So, but yeah, that's where the Navy,
Navy was great, but to your the order structure process is which I kind of learned and leaned for. But then also to spend the last nine years at GE, same thing, order structure process. So GE was a good fit for me for transitioning from the military to corporate America.
Deborah Weinswig (09:25)
Now I know I like you so much. So my father was also in the military. was in the army and in intelligence. And then he went on to study physics and more. And he was like one of the most disciplined people. I mean, every day you're gonna laugh. I probably have some around. I actually probably have like a whole, I literally, I'm sharing way too much. I have an entire box of ⁓ three by five cards because my father, I literally, I won't even share it, but like I literally go through like every day.
Elias Oxendine (09:31)
Yeah?
Okay.
Deborah Weinswig (09:53)
Because that like growing up starting at like age five, we would write down our schedule for the day and he would check it. And then at night when he came home, he would make sure that we had done everything. And if it took us more or less time, he'd ask us why. And so when I went to college, I will say that my father was such a huge asset and I would call him every morning when I started. And I said, you know, this is what's on my plate today. This is how I'm thinking about spending my time, because going back to right, your time is so valuable and.
You know, I think the military does such an amazing job of helping you think about how you're spending your time, whether it's strategic or tactical. And that really, I think, sets you up for an amazing kind of lifetime of success, the more that you lean into it.
Elias Oxendine (10:37)
Yeah, no, absolutely. Another common point with your father, said physics, Same, right? You know, I had a childhood dream. I wanted to be an astronaut, right? Clearly, clearly I'm not, right? So yeah, zigzag and those things. But yeah, from the disciplinary aspect, 100 % there, Deborah.
You know, it shows up in my day in my life. I'll operate now writes. I'm early riser. I'm always I'm a morning person. You know, I'm up super early hitting the gym, getting everything started to make sure I get set for the day. And then everything else kind of falls in order from that point. I plan my day. What I plan to accomplish. If you ever want to see me lose, lose my marbles, just disrupt my schedule, my calendar. Then you will see some things like, wow, lies. I never knew you were this high. Strong. I didn't know. Now you know.
Deborah Weinswig (11:10)
Mm-hmm.
It was, I was very much that way until I started to spend a lot of time in Asia. right, at the end of the day, you're, everyone's like, there's no such thing as jet lag. Well, I think there is, but you're just so jet lagged all the time, you don't really realize it. And so when you start to, like that becomes your way of life, you become a, like, first of all, you just let some of the smaller things fall by the wayside because you can only control so much.
Elias Oxendine (11:24)
Mmm.
Sure.
Deborah Weinswig (11:44)
And so that was because until that point, I think I had been very structured and, you know, it was funny growing up, my father was also very much about kind of being an entrepreneur and whatnot. And so when I was 10, I had like three different paper routes and they were all in apartment buildings. And so my dad would wake me up at five and it was great. I mean, it great. was an, I ended up being an athlete, but I you're running up and down the stairs. And of course, right.
Elias Oxendine (12:08)
K
Deborah Weinswig (12:08)
Having three paper routes, right, like I got my college, if you will, tuition earned by the time I was like 12. But he would be, you he wanted to just make sure I was safe. So he would drive me. mean, so he's getting up at five with me. Yeah, and he would wait outside, right, and make sure I was okay. Then he'd drive me home, then he'd go to work, right? Then he's working like a 12 hour day or whatever. And so those were, but like having that as your roots, it was...
Elias Oxendine (12:20)
Wow.
Yes.
Deborah Weinswig (12:31)
It was amazing to see and just, you know, and he never kind of like skipped a beat. so, you know, knowing that as kind of your DNA, can you talk about your time at GE and how a lot of friends who worked there and just knew them to grow a lot professionally while they were there.
Elias Oxendine (12:48)
Yeah, GE, think it was, once again, it was a good place for me coming out post the military, right? There was an interesting statistic at the time said for those of us that spent more than 10 years, know, active duty.
80 % would fail at their first job, you know, in corporate America, right? Because you have to unlearn that military leadership style and structure and those kinds of GE felt like home for me, quite honestly, right? Just to be very transparent. My first office was a converted broom closet that was painted gray like this ship. And it was the only, I was the only one in the office and my manager at the time was very apologetic about the setups. I'm sorry, we'll get you to an office with a window. And I was like, look at me. was like,
one desk. I yeah, it's just me in here. He said, I what are you complaining about? This is great. I'm back on the ship. And so,
GE to your point, you're structured and organized in those things. Once again, I felt very accustomed in being like home, basically going back to GE and particularly because of how GE operated. But then you had like this Six Sigma program. And so everyone goes through that process. And I am such a process oriented person. It just kind of felt natural to me. And then how that worked out for me in that regards. But GE was also very good about growing and growing leaders.
And so what I found at GE is that because of my background and because I've experienced working professional, I got exposed and took on a lot of projects that normally someone relatively knew the GE would not do, have the opportunity to do. that for me, you want to talk about some trials and tribulations while trying to transition from the military to corporate America. But I thrive in that environment, Deborah, because of the structure, because they have more acronyms than we have in the military, right? So I was like, this is great. And once you know them all, you crack the
and you start speaking and you're there, right? But it was a great opportunity for it to expose me to.
And they just reinforce a lot of that process structure and that discipline you're talking much your father the Navy has got me conditioned to working, you know, 14 16 hour days, right? I only survive in four or five hours of so but I can go in and pull a full day Most effective in the morning if you catch me in the afternoon I tell my team all the time do not ask me to make a heavy decision after three o'clock I will always punt to the next day into which I know I'm sharpest there from our perspective But no GE was a great spring
board for me to get in and get back into IT and cyber and those things. But yes, the structure, how GE operated, how GE group leaders and develop leaders, that was the best thing for me, would say, post the craft experience.
Deborah Weinswig (15:26)
And then at Yom, you were the Siso, so a lot of questions to unravel there, but how was that transition? You know, not quite cheese whiz, but... And then how have you seen the role of the... I mean, we've seen unbelievable change, much more than I think I even expected in that role. So can you talk about that transition and then just what that role meant, maybe even when you got there and when you left?
Elias Oxendine (15:36)
Hmm.
Yeah, and so before I went to YUM, I did do a brief stint, five years of Brown Forman, right? So hopefully folks understand Brown Forman's Alcohol and Spirits Company, right? Jack Daniels with Reserve and those things. So I led that program, but then I was approached by the opportunity at YUM. And so with YUM, the particular challenge
The other places I had been working as a C-Show, I always could mandate, hey, here's what you're going to do. Here's how you're going to operate. At Yum, 98 % of their business model is franchisee. Right. And so from that perspective, I cannot mandate and dictate what these folks must do at their stores. Right. I can help market, sell, and influence. But now, mind you, you already know my experience at Kraft, so you know I couldn't market and sell cheese whiz, but...
I can market and sell security strategies and those kinds of things. so ⁓ coming into the YUM role, I said, the thing that challenged me there was, okay, how do I influence these franchisees to implement some of these security strategies, tools, et cetera, so on? Because you gotta remember from the franchisee perspective, those are lean margins and they're focused on what's gonna help me sell more chicken.
pizza or tacos, right? This does not contribute to that. So, why should I do this, right? So, ⁓ I came with a standards versus ⁓ a systems, a services approach, right? And what that means is I had a list of services we had available at YUM, that if you subscribe to those services, you were fine, got it. If you did not subscribe to those services, then you, whatever service you used, it had to be compliant with our standards, right? So, that's why you have that services versus a standards approach.
That worked, I did pretty well in that perspective. But I think to your point, Deborah, how has the role changed when I got there and then where it is now? You know, I was a COVID hire. I joined the company in June 2020. And so from that perspective, like all the other folks that were out there, big shift into e-commerce and those things, right? So it really went from a traditional kind of security program how did I work to enable that as developers working on an e-comp, you know,
mobile apps and those kinds of things. How do we get security embedded in those processes? know, shift left further up into that. And so, like I said, the big change that I saw was coming in to the organization that went from a traditional security program to how do we run faster to keep up with the developers to make sure they're putting good code out there and making sure that every transaction is safe, secure and sound.
Deborah Weinswig (18:13)
mean, as you're saying that I'm thinking about putting good code out there and as we've entered the world of Gen.ai and now Agentic, right? There's, I mean, I was sitting with an executive the other day and this is from a Corsight advisory perspective or Corsight research advisory perspective when we go into someone's office, especially when I'm with senior folks, I'll just kind of pull up a chair and just say, you know, just why don't you show me how you're using it and like your day to day and yes, you're like CEO president and whatnot and.
I was watching and I will say I was probably even starting to sweat even though I'm quite cool. knew that the organization walled off chat GBT this person's popping up perplexity and Gemini and Claude and I'm like, just sitting there and I'm like, oh, I'm like, you know, I'm playing dumb. like, oh, I'm like, what do you upload there? Whatever. And he's like, oh, like earnings release. And I'm like, oh no, And then you're like, okay.
So the CISO starts to become your best friend because there's obviously some training that needs to happen, but it needs to be very structured. you have someone who's using some of these new tools at, mean, they're changed. mean, in the last week, we had three massive announcements. So I don't know where we want to say people are sophisticated or not in their usage. It's just like you're just, you feel like you're trying to hang on and not
Elias Oxendine (19:31)
Yes.
Deborah Weinswig (19:31)
I feel like I'm on like a speedboat and I'm just trying to make sure I don't fall off because and like what I'm finding personally is Right. I mean I'm I'm a knowledge based kind of thinker I'm spending two it used to be kind of like 90 minutes and now it's literally like two two and a half hours a day and I'm just trying to stay up with things I don't even feel like I'm not ahead. I'm just like
And so, because we're trying to make sure that we're a step ahead of our clients in terms of just protecting the house. And so how are you educating people internally and even, right? And it's the people at HQ, it's people in the stores and then those who are interacting with your environment.
Elias Oxendine (20:16)
Yeah, so a couple of things, couple of thoughts on that. ⁓
to your, I was cringing with you and you said you're sitting with this executive that is uploading these things up into the different, know, LLMs that are outside what their enterprise, you know, a gen AI platform is. And so for us, initially, my joint tractor, those were all blocked, right? You did not get unfettered access to those, right? And so you did have to go through a process to kind of get that information out, access to those sites. Once you had that, we did at the time, we did not have the appropriate security controls in place.
But now, know, Deborah, we do, right? So we use a combination of CASB along with DOP, particularly if anyone is trying to use anything that's outside of tractors control, what we do, are deemed to be sanctioned, right, and approved. And so what was interesting is that we were able to assess, what's the, what AI sides of people go into the most and using the most? And I would tell you what surprised us, it was Grammarly, right? And so this was before.
This is for we had co-pilot enabled in the environment, right? And so we pulled this back and like, okay, grammarly. I'm like, okay, yes, people were visiting CLAW, Gemini, these things, but it wasn't as much as we intended and expected. And so it was grammarly. But what we have done, just I've came on board, just look, we will continue to control what people do not, what's approved and what's not approved, right? So we would work for that perspective. What we have done now is we've entered into an agreement, you know, with OpenAI for a chat GPT, right? So to your point, we're operating with
secure a bubble within their framework and their environment and those kind of things, which is great, ⁓ that works out for us just fine from that perspective. But back in August, and as you know, Glenn, Glenn is the VP responsible for AI and machine learning. Glenn went, once we locked in that agreement with OpenAI, we went on a crusade to eventually get it exposed and shared to everyone, but we wanted to provide training. And so we have done, we have generated an acceptable use policy for AI, right?
And trying to be very simple there, Debra. Here are some simple do's and don'ts, even providing examples to where people understand, hey, okay, here's kind of what I can do and I can't do. But the two, Traktor Way, we had a town hall back in August and it was kind of the AI takeover. So you've got Glen and I up there. Glen has all the fun stuff, right? He's getting everybody excited. We're going to chat, GPT-5, these things. And then he sends me up to talk about do's and don'ts. I'm like...
Deborah Weinswig (22:20)
Mmm.
Elias Oxendine (22:41)
I'm gonna be the buzz cure here, bud. What you talking about? This is not what I wanna do. so, continue to educate them on, like I said, acceptable use, et cetera, so on.
Deborah Weinswig (22:42)
you
Elias Oxendine (22:50)
The next thing that we're doing in the next upcoming weeks is to introduce to the organization the AI Governance Council and what we're all about, right? So governance is a big thing here to make sure that yes, AI is a great tool and these things, right? We want to make sure that we're using it in a safe, you know, protected kind of way and those things. And so the principle behind that is to educate to the employees, our team members that look, if you have a business case or an idea, we want you to bring it to this AI Governance
Deborah Weinswig (22:58)
Peace.
Elias Oxendine (23:19)
So this is really about practicing and exercising responsible AI. And so that governance council is a cross-functional team that I happen to chair. But as a business case comes through, everyone knows what hat and what lens they are to look at this.
business case through. We take it through a rubric, we get scores, we meet weekly, and then we'll come back the following week to render a decision on it and those kinds of things. So the education is through the policy. It is also through introducing to the organization who the council is and what we're for. And once again, if you have an idea where to go. The next step in this education awareness though, Deborah, is got to get with, ⁓
some type of quick training videos. How do we make this fun? Gone are the traditional ways I'm partly to blame here, but the boring security, you know, video, emails, right? Those things. How do you think about how people learn today? For me, the first thing I do is I'm going on to YouTube somewhere, right? And then also I'm looking at is this video longer than two minutes? If it's longer than two minutes, I'm going somewhere else, right? Or I'm going to chat GPT. So hey, give me this watered down version of it.
So the next thing for us is how do we make that training fun and exciting and in short bursts and clips of meaningful information? So I've got a new director who's joined Tractor and my challenge has been to him is how do we know if our training program is effective or not? You how are we measuring that? How are we making sure that it lands at a stick? So long way to answer your question, but yes, we are introducing and educating through policies, making sure people understand we have a governance process in place. Here's who the council is.
The next step really is around education. How do we lose short bursts? How do we get fun and exciting and not that Charlie Brown, wah, wah, wah. No, people gotta walk away, like, wow, I got some, understand now how I can use this tool.
Deborah Weinswig (25:09)
No, it's so interesting because this week I was invited to be part of OpenAI's Innovation Forum. And so we meet on a fairly regular basis. And so they had Lucas Kaiser. I mean, have a bit of a fangirl, right? He was one of the original authors in 2017. Of Attention is All You Need. first of all, was interesting. He had similar intonation as I do. And so first of all, I'm like, don't often, people will be like, where are you from? And I'm like, you know, I'm.
Elias Oxendine (25:23)
You
Deborah Weinswig (25:36)
said, you know, I'm kind of from all over. I moved a lot with my dad. you know, but it was so I was interested in listening to him because of that. But to your point, he's talking about snails and flowers. And I'm watching his like, you know, the and it's not super, you know, it's very simplistic slides and there's movement. And so we write a course site. We were told that if you know that the
these days with you can call it goldfish brain or squirrel brain or whatever you want, but that you need to have some kind of movement about every eight seconds or you're starting to lose people. And I felt like, you know, he had that under right. Like he really thought about that. But it was an hour, which felt like five minutes. And it was the way that he approached the materials. And I came away and I really, you my mind was playing it over. I was like, I really did learn a lot. And.
We, you know, it's interesting because in our AI council, we're doing kind of monthly training, but we've been asked by a lot of boards to do board training. And I think board members can sit for a long time and they can ingest a lot. And so, but at the end of the day, right, this is a topic that we want it to be, you know, we want them to not have to go back and study it, right? That they, because of how quickly it's changing. And so we've started to look into some of the training materials and to your point.
Right? Having kind of maybe a one hour session, but then having, right, kind some of these shorter, you know, two minutes, three minutes, kind of videos go back and remind yourself what you learned. Because I think right now, and especially in an organization the size of Tractor Supply where everyone learns in different ways, that's a lot. And what was the, if you will, what was the stimulants to put in place the AI Governance Council? Because I think you're very
early on that, but I absolutely think it's right way to go.
Elias Oxendine (27:25)
Yeah,
yeah, 100 % of the training, like you said, you got to figure out how people can retain it. Right. And so, and we're going to try that out. That struggle is real and we'll let you know how successful we've been with that. Right. And so, but in terms of the governance council, what kind of was the premise that brought that together?
Early days and you know Rob. Rob is always a strategic thinker. He is just always on point and things he sees coming up. like, hey, AI is becoming more of a thing now. So therefore this kind of becomes a potential risk retractor if we don't put a process and some structure around it. And so because I am responsible for IT risk, know, AI, same thing. Hey, Elias, this kind of plays in your space and your wheelhouse. that time when I joined, we had a...
You know, tractors already had been using AI, right? We use for a guru, we use for track division and those kind of things. And so it really was, we didn't have a lot of use cases that was coming to IT for review. A lot of the business cases were originated within IT. But what we found out with a larger, you know, announcement about open AI as more of our team members start to know about it, we had a number of ideas that were starting to surface and people were like, Hey, so I got this great idea that's going to help.
Where do I go? What's the processing? Those kinds of things. And so I think it really was Rob's foresight. know, Deborah, that brought it together to get established because we started seeing more of our business functional leaders bringing thoughts and ideas to the table. Right. And I will tell you how, how was the catalyst, a lot of this, right. So how was doing, you know, he's a techie guy and he's into a lot of things. And so he was bringing some of that back, I think, to his staff and leadership team and saying, Hey, we got to get in front of this. And so when we, when that was done.
We saw the ideas start to come and therefore we had to have a process which we could channel, govern these things and make sure we're doing what's right and best for Tractor.
Deborah Weinswig (29:10)
Well, and as you're also opening up kind of the proverbial Pandora's box, but this idea that people have permission to think differently and to think about how to kind of push Tractor forward, I think that is what, you know, I've seen Hal do that at several organizations and to have a CEO with that kind of background, but also that kind of interest and curiosity.
I think that that's also what's, I mean, really at this point, right, tractor supply is really a leader in this area. And I think that, you know, as we think about the physical stores and then online, unified commerce, however we want to put it all together, how do you think about kind of edge compute at this point?
Elias Oxendine (29:54)
Yeah, fair question. And so that's one of the things that kind of keeps me up in these kind of things. Right. And so what we're primarily trying to do is to your point, keep everything at the edge and safe. Right. And a couple of ways in which we're approaching that is we're using the combo of a tech stack to kind of make sure we have those things in place, Deborah. And this is where I mentioned before, this is a combination of DLP technology in addition with CASB. Right. And so.
The reason why the DOP piece is important because we're talking about email, we're talking about endpoint, but then obviously people are starting to use the cloud, the SaaS products and solutions from that perspective. And so we're taking converged approach, if you will, and trying to drive that and make that work in that standpoint. So, still early days for us in that capacity, in that light, but we're on a journey on our way there. so, but then to make sure my answer your question correctly, I'll make sure that I'm speaking to that a little bit. not, then, you know,
explain a little bit more and can hopefully come back with stronger response.
Deborah Weinswig (30:52)
Yeah, no, first of all, that's super helpful. But then in physical stores, where especially during these periods, right, you can have challenges with just the amount of bandwidth. So how do you look at kind of compute at the edge and really powering the stores? Because I think over time, right, we're just going to see more and more getting done at the stores.
Elias Oxendine (31:12)
Yep,
yeah, so what we're doing there and part of our project plan for 2026 is we're looking to upgrade the wireless networks in the stores right now. Today we.
You know, when we have our leadership fundamentals and we have store managers come on site and we as a leadership team go down and engage with them for dinner and these kind of things. One of the biggest things we always hear in this case, you Deborah, is about, you know, connectivity in stores, slow network performance and those kind of things, right? And so we are at the point in time now where we are investing to upgrade that network to support much more activity we're doing at the store. If you think about it, we're transitioning into a single device.
And so with that single device, we're adding a lot more applications and these things. And so what I often share with my peers is that, look, it's almost like building a house. You can build up above ground as much as possible. If you don't have that solid foundation that's going to support those apps is right across that network, that wireless piece, those kind of things. It is doomed to not be successful. And so we are investing in that to improve that infrastructure, those things that the store is going forward in twenty twenty six.
Deborah Weinswig (32:19)
I was in Nashville a few weeks ago and had an amazing opportunity to be on stage with Hal. And on my flight back to New York, I was on a United Airlines regional jet. I'm sitting in the, you're waiting to board and all of a sudden I get this on my laptop, I really thought I'd been hacked, be prepared for this amazing onboard experience. And I'm like, what is going on? So my screen is blue, it's like the color of my shirt.
So I get on and I flip over my laptop to get on the Wi-Fi and it's that same exact message. I'm like, what's going on? So it was Starlink. so, so United has Starlink between Nashville and New York. I'm telling you, I'm fast. I got like 10 hours of work done in two hours. I've never experienced anything like it was almost outer body. And I'm like, this is, like, I'm going to go back and forth between Nashville and New York all the time. And.
Elias Oxendine (32:53)
Yes. Good. Yep.
Deborah Weinswig (33:11)
But you start to think, I will say it was one of those things I got home and I couldn't turn my brain off, because when you start to think about what you can do, well first of I've thought about many things, but A, how can you hack yourself, right? Because if you can get that much work done in that period of time, that was amazing. Then I started to worry about, you're working at that speed, what is the other side of that?
But if you start to think about the physical stores, and I know what a lot of store managers and district and regional, what they often talk about is how you have this completely different experience online and offline. But to me, once we start to see more of that in the stores, your in-store experience, I think, actually be better and more technologically charged. mean, problem with... ⁓
Elias Oxendine (33:54)
better.
Deborah Weinswig (33:59)
This is why I never thought that e-commerce was going to be more than like, let's say 30%. And yes, I understand at Williams & Emmer, Crane & Barrel, right? It's in the 40s and way fair. But because it's 2D, right? And here we still don't have a lot of live streaming, right? Because that's 3D. So in a 2D world, right, where our products are 3D, stores win, right? And if we can get the bandwidth and we can...
I think, I mean, the thing I've always learned about Tractor Splice is completely experiential, right? I'm like, I was in there with my team. We had come and done a presentation, my gosh, it might've been back in like 2016 at HQ. And I'm like in the stores and there's like little baby chickens and stuff like this is like the coolest thing ever, right? I'm like, and I was like, can I take like the baby chickens home with me, right? Like, you know, this, and as they start to have, right? Like there becomes this really, I've never had it in any, and I mean, I've never had it in any other retailer.
Elias Oxendine (34:39)
Yes.
Great.
Deborah Weinswig (34:52)
you start to build this interesting bridge between the physical store and yourself. And there's like a magic, I'm sure it's much more kind of thought out, but I do think between the loyalty program, where we've had the pleasure of seeing all that develop over time, it's amazing what's happened. So if you think about where we are today and where we're going,
from a kind of security perspective are you thinking of and because things are changing at such a rapid pace, how do you stay in front of it?
Elias Oxendine (35:29)
Yeah, so we have and engage with a number of partners and how we bring these things to life, right? And so we don't do this all by ourselves, right? And so we have a number of partners in which we work with and what we're doing there, know, Deborah's pushing them.
to figure out, how do we ensure that we're driving secure practices, connections, connectivity at the physical store level? Because to your point, the majority of our revenue for Tractor is coming from the stores, even though we see digital increasing, it's all about how do we still continue to maximize that in-store experience? And so I guess the short way to answer without getting into a lot of details and revealing too much is that we do have partners in which we're working with in terms of how do we get there together to stay in front of it, right?
team by ourselves, we just can't stay in front of it. So it is often done with key strategic partners to make sure that we're working together on how do we do that. And so I will share with you ⁓ some of the partners we're working with in terms of getting and connectivity out to these stores. We're seeing a lot of new cool stuff come to the forefront. And so when we go through these EBCs and we're having these conversations and the EBCs will often be Rob and I.
But Rob would kind of share his vision, what he's thinking. And then it's very interesting to see how our partners come to life. Say, we can help you with that. And here's how we do that. So once that initial conversation at Bridge is done, then that's where I'm following up with my counterpart on that partner side to really get into the details. Okay. Help me walk through this and I'm going to bring some of my smart folks to talk to your smart folks.
to make sure that, can we do this? Can we do this safe and secure, but still give the store the network connectivity and the bandwidth that it needs to bring this to life, right? And so that's kind of how that works out. But I have a lot of occasional meetings with my partners, know, Deborah, to stay on top in front of these things and see what they're bringing to the table to help us on this journey.
Deborah Weinswig (37:21)
You know, it's really interesting that you brought that up. So we hosted eight startups in a friend of mine's office who runs an &A boutique. And I've known him for 20 plus years. And it was so interesting how different our questions were, right? Mine from a research background, his from a banking background. And so he asked each of them, like, who were your partners? How are they getting you to market? And I was like, the partners are bringing you to market?
And he looks at me and he's like in an AI world, he said that the relationship between kind of, you know, partner and kind of end consumer, if you will, is completely changing. And what you like, what you as the buyer are expecting from your partner, he's he said that's totally changed in 2025. And he expects that to change even more. And so what we're starting to see, which once again, I've never I would never have expected that great partners
They care so much about the relationship that they will go out and seek great startups, great technology. And when you're then buying, if you will, that technology, you're doing it through them so they can ensure a great experience. It's not that they're trying, they're in no way trying to limit your relationship with the startup or the tech company. They just want to make sure that you have, and I said, you know, that's something I never would have expected because obviously it creates a lot of friction and what I mean, they seem to be like, this is easy, but.
Elias Oxendine (38:40)
Yeah.
Deborah Weinswig (38:41)
I guess going back to that's where some of the magic is, but what in your opinion, right? To me, that's a very big change. And I do understand the past, right? A lot of consulting firms, right? They served in that role, but now we're seeing it's more and more your technology partners.
Elias Oxendine (38:57)
Yeah, absolutely. ⁓ If you look at the VoIP solution that we're introducing into our stores, right? And so through our
Deborah Weinswig (39:02)
Thank
Elias Oxendine (39:05)
with T-Mobile, ⁓ they have a company brought on, it's called Dialpad.
Deborah Weinswig (39:09)
Mm-hmm.
Elias Oxendine (39:09)
And
Dialpad is helping us deliver that VoIP solution in store. And so to your point, ⁓ it's very interesting how the relationship started off because at first it was their standard out of the box solution. But what we've done is we've kind of tractorized it, right? So to your point, as we've gotten into the conversations and discussions with T-Mobile and Dialpad, we have asked for things that kind of make it fit better for tractor. then to your point, it is a technicological, you know,
Partnership at this point is not and I will tell you there isn't a lot of friction there Deborah ⁓ We have stood up a top-to-top Just recently between tractor T-mobile and dial path to talk about current state of projects Where we're going? What are they bringing new to the table? What are tractors requirements? know, hey, it's great We got it in but guess what it's going to evolve, right? So how do we continue to bring to their attention what we're looking for and then just talking about to are they any? roadblocks that are preventing us
from bringing these things to life. And so we're seeing some good returns there on this. We are in the process of rolling out the UCAS, the Dialpad solution to a number of stores for Q4. And then we're going to go full, a full push into 2026 and 27. So, but it is very much a technology partnership. It is not your traditional, hey, give requirements and those kinds of things, because the development work they're doing, it moves so quickly. And in order to get that technology out to the stores, I mean,
Debra, we had ASM, people got a little bit of taste of what was coming. People are standing in line at the network table and asking, hey, when can we get on this new solution, right? These current phones, right? They're a little old hardware, those kinds of things are having issues. And so people are very excited about this technology, but the success there is, I tell the team all the time, it's one team, one fight. We are not three different companies. We are one and pushing to make sure we deliver success for the stores.
Deborah Weinswig (40:59)
What's so interesting about that as well, if you think about it, or I've thought about this a lot, when you're working with a technology partner that's not charging you consulting fees, then you as the buyer, you're really pushing, and I mean that in very positive way, on more information because you're not thinking about the dollars and cents that are being added up. And so I believe that this is a much better way to achieve success than
Elias Oxendine (41:16)
Yes.
Deborah Weinswig (41:26)
What we saw, let's say, in 24, I feel like this is a big change. And I think that these relationships, and once again, removing a lot of that friction in terms of, okay, I've got all of these different contracts, right? If you're doing everything through kind of like one mouth, I just think that this is going to start to really change how decisions are made, how success is driven, and ultimately how employees, customers, and shareholders feel about things.
And so I feel like we're on the brink of something quite new. And it is interesting going back to the beginning of our conversation, just how Tractor is really leaning into that and almost driving it.
Elias Oxendine (42:05)
Yeah, I mean, and once again, tractor is we're always first to the door, right? I to use a military analogy, but yeah, we're always first to the door. We're not second to third to anyone. So we will push on our partners. And that's a good term. And you mean it in a very positive way.
It's like, look, here's the need that we have and our expectations that you're going to either go find someone, start up, can bring it to light, or you guys already have this in the works. And so ⁓ this is my first time trying to work through that experience at Hero Tractor. once again, I'll be quite honest. I am very surprised at the pace and the speed. Now, yes, we have, there's some give and take, right? Some slowdowns and speed up.
But I do think to your point, we are doing something very that's new here. And like I said, we're seeing very positive results. We have worked with our partner starting off, was kind of, you know, start slow. But once we got into the rhythm of how we're going to operate and work together as a team, and to your point, we're bringing requirements to them all the time. And what's happening is because we're not thinking about the cost on it, they're actually coming back and flipping those requirements very quickly. We will take it out to a set number of pilot stores. Hey, this works, change this, tweak that.
So that is allowing us to give a level of speed and bringing those things to light. so, but yeah, we are very assertive in pushing them. and as tractor, have high expectations, right? And so we're challenging our partners to live up to those. And so far we're seeing that.
Deborah Weinswig (43:27)
Well, I, you know, as you mentioned that I do think that that is, if I were to think about some of the characteristics, right. I've always looked at tractors of learning organization and one that has very high levels of expectations. And so it's interesting if you combine the two of those with great tech or great tech partners and right. Employees, customers, shareholders, all that, right. Your, opportunity in this environment, I think it really kind of plays to your strengths.
Elias Oxendine (43:54)
Yeah, I would agree with that. And we're really waiting to see what that looks like, you know, in return, right? So right now with the VoIP solution we're rolling out, it really is how do we take those team members in stores that are having, you know, challenges and issues with the network, with the phone system, right?
And just the fact that we have so many people asking for that and then the positive feedback response that we're getting, people are like, this is great. I love this. What took you so long? Right. I'm like, hey, we're coming. Right. We're getting there. Right. And those things, but to your point, yeah, because think about it. If we make sure that team member shows up, the last thing we want them to do is worry about phone issues. Right. We want them focused on the customer, everything that Tractor is known for, et cetera, et cetera. And so this, through this partnership, and to your point, the combination of both of these things, it is positioning us to
actually realize those and bring those things to fruition. So very early with the VoIP solution, but we're getting it out there. And so we are well on our way. ⁓ for me, I love getting positive by team and I, we love getting positive feedback from the stores. Because right now, if something's not working, trust me, we hear about it. Yeah.
Deborah Weinswig (44:58)
Alright, we're going to
go into our very quick lightning round. So I'll ask you five questions. You can take a pass if you want on any of them as well or answer a different question. It's always what we were told in our media training. Okay, so number one, the most underrated cyber skill.
Elias Oxendine (45:07)
⁓ Okay.
Communication and what I mean by that, the ability to take tech and then speak in regular business terms so where your audience can understand it. Know your audience, communicate in their language.
Deborah Weinswig (45:23)
That's a great one. A cybersecurity myth that refuses to die.
Elias Oxendine (45:27)
I would say one, people I still see try to practice defense in depth, is not, which is a okay. But you've that that's an old legacy kind of thought when it comes to protecting the networking nowadays. Cause people have a tendency, they just parachute in over the top. And so you gotta not only worry about what's in front of you, 2D, you gotta worry about what's coming in from a different perspective as well.
Deborah Weinswig (45:46)
I that. What will define retail cyber resilience five years from now?
Elias Oxendine (45:51)
I would say for us, the resilience piece, the way, you think about how that would manifest and show up is that are we able to maintain our customer's trust, right? Which means the systems are up, operationals, privacy is in place, they're not worried about their data being looked at, leaked out and those kinds of things, right? So I would say trust, if we can maintain that high trust, then everything else falls in place.
Deborah Weinswig (46:10)
The privacy is a very important one. think that's a very good point to bring up. Thank you. If you could, number four, and we've got one left after this, if you could redesign cybersecurity education for retail employees, what would you teach first?
Elias Oxendine (46:24)
I guess you go with additional phishing and those kinds of things. The reason I'm struggling with that, I think there's a lot more based on how threat actors are operating today and getting into organizations, but it's phishing, but it's also browsing safety as well. I would do a combination of both of those. Deborah, give me two for one. Let me do the safe browsing along with the phishing.
Deborah Weinswig (46:44)
I have to double click on that because we recently had, I I was able to tell but I would say it, I read things a few times. So we turned up and I was like, I said to the tech team, I'm like, everything says like external, external, external, I'm the cautious, you're applying to people and it says cautious. I'm like, wait, turn it down, turn it down. So also getting that right balance I think is really, can be tough. ⁓
Elias Oxendine (47:06)
Yeah,
only reason I say the safe browsing piece is because it's not just phishing where these things are happening. You got all these pop-ups, people go to these websites, etc. So water hole attacks and those things, right? So there's a one-two combo there. I think it needs to be ⁓ trained and communicated out to people.
Deborah Weinswig (47:22)
Agree. right, last one. Biggest misconception about your role.
Elias Oxendine (47:25)
⁓ The role has expanded so much, right? I've got like a divisional CTO, CIO, and those kinds of things, right? ⁓ There is, because of what I have right now, the one piece people automatically assume is that I own infrastructure as well, right? On cloud, on-prem and cloud, right? I don't, that's with Glenn and those kinds of things, right? And so, but I don't know. I've got to come back and think about that one. And so I haven't given that one thought, but yeah.
Deborah Weinswig (47:51)
I think
what we've seen from a of cyber and that perspective is that exactly to your point though, I think the physical, the infrastructure side versus, that's where there is often a misperception. And because so many companies we know, they were on-prem, they went to cloud, now they're going back to on-prem, so more hybrid. And so who owns what? That's where I think it's...
Elias Oxendine (47:59)
Mmm, I got it.
Yeah.
Yep. Yep.
Great. Yep.
Deborah Weinswig (48:19)
It gets confusing from the outside and the inside.
Elias Oxendine (48:19)
Yep.
It does, because with the role change, right? And so it's just kind of, hey, what fits, what makes more sense to fit here, but you hit right where I was going to go. I'm also mistaken that I own physical security as well too. And so I have to tell people all the time, I say, look,
Yes, and I think it's because the military background, right? So they automatically just make that connection. Hey, the physical presence there. So, and I'm like, now there's, are chief security roles out there. They're responsible for both cyber and physical, but yes, I had someone about a month ago brought to my attention. Hey, there's a white van sitting outside, you know, in the circle there. And I'm like, okay, did you, did you call, you know, did you call Barbara and get physical security? I was like, well, don't you own physical too? And I was like,
I could if the organist gave that to me, but that's not my role or your security. said, well, I'm cyber security, not physical. yes, if you hit it right in the head, yeah, that is the one misconception I would say that's out there. know, Debra's that I also own physical in addition to cyber.
Deborah Weinswig (49:16)
Yeah, no, this is, mean, Elias, this is amazing. I could talk to you all day, because this feels like it was five minutes, and I think we just touched the absolute surface. I mean, you really are such a leader in our industry, because you've got this amazing background. You've continued to, I think, push yourself and challenge yourself. And the impact that you've had at every organization and that you're still having today is truly, you know.
It's world renowned and we just want to thank you for joining us. This is such a special time for us. Thank you.
Elias Oxendine (49:47)
All right, Deborah, once again, thank you for the time and for the interest in these things. So I'm glad to be here and be part of this activity. So thank you.
Deborah Weinswig (49:53)
Thank you.
Philip Moore (49:54)
Thanks Deborah and thank you for joining us. CoreSite Research serves our members in multiple ways with cutting edge research, leadership forums, data resources, strategic advisory services and more. Visit us at coresite.com to learn how a CoreSite Research membership can accelerate your success. Have a wonderful day and we'll see you next week.