Road Warriors: Bonnie Wisnowski
TEXT OF STORY
Bill Radke: I hope you’ve been able to find a little time off this summer, a chance to get away from the routine. For some people, getting away, that is their routine. The business traveler has a special relationship with the road, and we’ve been finding out this summer how musical that relationship can be.
Producer Michael Raphael’s been bringing us a series called Road Warriors, where we get to tap into people’s headphones and hear the soundtracks they choose when they are working far from home. Today, the line of work is women’s fashion and the in-flight music is key.
Bonnie Wisnowski: I’m Bonnie Wisnowski. I’m the director of visual presentation for Eileen Fisher. When I’m on the road, I listen to the song “The Funeral” by Band of Horses.
“The Funeral” by Band of Horses
I start listening to this song usually when I get settled into the plane. It’s even usually before take-off. I tend to be a pretty big plane sleeper, so I like to put it on fairly quickly in my journey, so that I can kind of ground myself and mellow out and ignore everybody around me, and listens and hopes that I’ll fall asleep.
Yeah, if you ever see me on an airplane, do not talk to me. Uh, no.
I love when I’m traveling, because I get tippy-creative. And honestly, most of my merchandising nowadays is on paper, or think with teams about concepts, but when I’m actually on the road is when I get to try and bring it to life. I imagine it’s like somebody who’s a carpenter, always only sketching and planning and designing versus actually building. And when they actually build, it comes to life. It’s sort of like that for me with merchandising.
We went to go install some windows at Bloomingdale’s in San Francisco this last spring. And the team that I did it with was totally incredible, and we would get up at the crack of dawn just so that we can get done by four ‘o clock and then take the rental car and get out of the city. And we went and drove all around the beaches, and it was breathtaking. So it was kind of neat to think, “OK, I was in a Bloomingdale’s window two hours ago, and now I’m on a beach that has black sand and huge crashing waves.”
Maybe I shouldn’t be saying how much I like it, ’cause then everybody’s going to be like, “You can’t go anymore.”
Radke: You know, we’ve got a whole music section on our website. You can listen to some of Bonnie’s other favorites nd more than that. You can offer up your own playlist, your own suggestions — our listeners do jump into the musical fray, as you’ll see in the comments section.
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