How CNBC.com reporter Thomas became a name in retail

Lauren Thomas

Anna Robaton of Shopping Centers Today profiles CNBC.com retail reporter Lauren Thomas and explores her career.

Robaton writes, “How did a recent college graduate land such a high-profile position in a field where reporters often spend years paying their dues? The answer, it seems, is personal drive, talent and a bit of luck. As a journalism student at the University of North Carolina, Thomas spent her summers in the high-pressure, New York City media market. Over the course of several summers, she interned at Bloomberg, CNBC and TheStreet.com. She graduated from UNC Chapel Hill in December 2016 — finishing in only three and a half years — with a bachelor’s in journalism (and a specialty in business journalism), and then she hit the ground running.

“In early 2017 she parlayed the CNBC internship into an entry-level job as a news associate. Not long after starting there, she jumped at the chance to do some retail reporting when a change in staff left that beat without full-time coverage. The experience whet her appetite, and in February of that year she became a full-time retail reporter for CNBC Digital. ‘It’s humbling in a way,’ said Thomas. ‘You’re given so much responsibility and, obviously, you’re writing alongside a lot of [experienced] journalists at other places.’

“From a journalist’s perspective, there has never been a more exciting — and challenging — time to cover the retail sector, says Thomas, whose enthusiasm, intense curiosity and commitment to fairness and accuracy have served her well as a fledgling journalist and relative newcomer to her beat. ‘Now is a more exciting time than ever to be covering this, because there is so much evolution in the industry,’ she said. ‘Everyone is waking up and realizing they can’t continue to do things like they did for the past few decades.'”