To reverse engineer the secret sauce driving QVC’s $8.8 billion business, I went to the network’s school, then sold a product on air.
It’s five minutes to air, and I’m practicing my “card tricks”—what I’ve come to see as my greatest nemesis. I have to open a wallet, reveal a mirrored metal battery without reflecting the studio lights, yank out a stubborn plug, and slide it into my iPhone, all while aiming this electronic jumble at the camera and pretending the whole charade is effortless—in front of the late night viewers of QVC, the No. 1 home shopping network in the U.S., U.K., and Germany.
