Even as many national retailers have been opening bigger and bigger stores -- Super Centers, Combo Stores, Hyper Markets and all variations of Giant and Mega -- other companies are going in the opposite direction, exploring the concept of the retail campus. Clustering From big chains like RH to specialty operations like Magnolia Home, the concept of clustering a group of individual stores together to create a single-branded shopping complex represents the first new take on physical retailing in generations. Not since Toys’R’Us invented the …
Experience
Mobile Shopping Is on The Move: Retailers Need to Move with It
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 …
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A Linear Path to Purchase Is an Illusion
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, …
How to Meet the Demands of the 2021 Gen Z Shopper
Buzzfeed has a fun quiz that lets people know if they're a millennial or Gen Z based on the clothes they like. Bucket hat? Gen Z. Skinny jeans? Millennials. To the casual reader, it might seem silly. To fashion marketers, knowing which trend appeals to which generation is key to reaching them and selling product. Yet when it comes to Gen Z, the pandemic has highlighted differences within the group as well as discrepancies between what they want and what is available -- presenting an opportunity in this younger market. Gen Z Anxiety Statista …
Is Makeup Dead?
Recently I received an email about Becca Cosmetics’ upcoming makeup launches, and I immediately emailed the brand publicist back: “I’m confused,” I wrote. “I thought Estée Lauder was shutting Becca down?” Covid Casualty After assuring me that that was in fact the case – that EL Companies had indeed pulled the plug on the 20-year-old brand, which it acquired in 2016 and was best-known for its Champagne Pop liquid highlighter - the publicist said that it’s business as usual until September, when Becca officially goes bye-bye. Why shutter a …
The WOW! Customer Experience
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 …
Nordstrom’s New Game Plan
I'm commenting on Nordstrom's latest strategic moves: their brick-and-mortar localization and online positioning, the "Closer to You" program and their concession strategy. However, before I do, I want to put these strategic moves into the proper context. They all emanate from a philosophy embedded in the Nordstrom's DNA from day one. And you know what it is. Nonetheless, I will repeat it just to connect the dots from where they started to the evolution of their current strategies. What a Quaint Philosophy: The Customer First How many times …
Let Them Eat Cake: Luxury Spend Is Up Among Next-Gens
Next-gens may fear economic uncertainty, but that’s not stopping them from making high ticket purchases. HighSnobiety reports that, by 2026, millennials and Gen Z will make up more than 60 percent of luxury spend. Chinese next-gens are leading the way. The average Chinese luxury consumer is a mere 28 years old –– that’s ten years younger than the global average. McKinsey reports that China’s luxury market will double by 2025, comprising a staggering 65 percent of global growth between 2018 and 2025. But here’s the biggie: 70 percent …
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