Pam Danziger

After months of pandemic-induced retail shutdowns, it comes as no shock that consumers turned online to do their shopping. Non-store retail sales grew 22 percent to end the year just under $1 trillion ($968 billion). In a nearly $4 trillion retail market, excluding autos, gasoline and food service, that means roughly one-out-of-four retail dollars happened outside brick-and-mortar stores’ four walls, including $883 billion conducted through electronic shopping and direct mail. The Digital Retail Highway What may have gone unnoticed is how …

Mobile Shopping Is on The Move: Retailers Need to Move with ItRead More

We’ve all been told a consumer’s path to purchase proceeds in a straight line: awareness, familiarity, consideration, purchase … and if done right, it leads to loyalty. It’s a logical step-by-step progression model and gives brands the confidence to manage customers’ engagement and activate them along each step in their journey. Illusion Unveiled The problem is that this linear model is an illusion. Human beings simply don’t work this way -- ever. Instead, a consumer’s path to purchase takes a circuitous route, moving forward, going sideways, …

A Linear Path to Purchase Is an IllusionRead More

How can pandemic-crushed specialty retailers that were too slow or ineffective ramping up their e-commerce capabilities come back from the brink? Don’t look to Amazon, the big-boxes or category killers for inspiration, advises Wharton Professor Thomas Robertson and director of its Jay H. Baker Retailing Center. Instead, set your sights on Ritz Carlton, Disney Parks and British Airways. “These are all people intensive businesses, and they manage to deliver excellent customer experiences consistently,” he says, referring to British …

The WOW! Customer ExperienceRead More

Remember when Restoration Hardware was the quirky DIY-fixer’s catalog for people restoring Victorian houses? It’s come a long way from its home-spun roots back in 1979 when Stephen Gordon founded it. Progressive CEO In his most recent shareholders letter, Gary Friedman, the company’s current chairman and CEO, updates RH’s progress since joining the company in 2011: “The first two decades saw us evolve from a nearly bankrupt business with a $20 million market cap and a box of Oxydol laundry detergent on the cover of its catalog, to the leading …

RH Builds Out its HorizonsRead More

The seemingly insulated luxury market has never experienced a year like 2020 when personal luxury goods sales dropped $78 billion from 2019 – a 23 percent decrease year-over-year – to a total $266 billion in 2020. With the pandemic threatening both consumers’ health and finances, the industry’s decline was more than double the 9 percent drop experienced over two years during the 2008-2009 recession, according to Bain & Company. It is not expected to recover to 2019 levels until the end of 2022 or early 2023. Luxury Through the Ages Bain …

Welcome to the Era of Conscientious LuxuryRead More