Remember when direct to consumer brands were all anyone could talk about? Warby Parker, Harry’s Shave Club, and a seemingly endless litany of subscription boxes dominated headlines just five years ago. During pandemic lockdowns, consumers went inward and connected even more deeply with their favorite brands. You’d think this would cause an even larger surge in DTC brands post-pandemic, but this hasn’t been the case. Forbes recently published an article stating that 2010 to 2020 was “the golden age for DTC companies.” So, what does that mean …
Strategy
WRC Is the Hub for Global Retail Leaders
There can be few better opportunities to gauge the mood and pinpoint the real issues facing retailers than when you bring together 750 senior industry leaders who collectively operate in most countries around the world. That’s the gist of this year’s World Retail Congress. So far, 2023 has proved to be particularly interesting given the tough backdrop for multinational retailers. So, as I recall the many sessions, keynote speakers and above all, the many collegial conversations, here are my top ten takeaways and reflections. Defiant …
Retail Brands Expand Services to Boost the Bottom Line
When Minneapolis-based Best Buy bought the then eight-year-old Geek Squad from founder Robert Stephens back in 2002, the move seemed anything but intuitive. Now, over two decades later, mergers and acquisitions of specialized service companies by retail brands have become commonplace. Smart Service Amidst ever tightening margins, major retail brands are seeking new profit centers, as well as attempting to burnish their brand loyalty and lifetime customer value. These “anti-Amazonation” inoculations, are seen as antidotes to ecommerce …
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World Retail Congress Presents Six Major Issues Facing Retail Leadership
If you talk to any retail CEO, anywhere in the world (as I have been over many months to build the World Retail Congress programme) the refrain is that there has never been a more challenging time to be in the top job. Even retail leaders with a good few years under their belts concede that they’ve never known a time like this. Perfect Stormfront Pre-2020 was a tough run for legacy brands with the relentless rise of ecommerce and its disruption to long-established, previously highly successful and lucrative business models. But then …
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Is It Time for a Return of the Catalog?
Retailers have always been at the forefront to meet consumer needs. Successful retailers know their markets intimately and have adapted to meet new customer trends. Being consumer-dependent, retail has transformed its branding over and over from Burma-Shave road signs to the metaverse. Everything Old Is New Again To move forward, it often takes perspective. Trends can be cyclical, so what used to work, then didn’t, can now work better than before. Why? Nostalgia is one explanation. But what’s truer is the fact that while the …
An Argument for Neighborhood Stores
Specialty retailers – from legacy brands and DTCs to startups – are all facing the same challenge: Declining mall traffic and higher downtown office vacancy rates are making traditional store location decisions far riskier. Brands are wondering if neighborhood stores are the next frontier. If Target, Macy’s, Starbucks, Faherty, Lululemon, Vineyard Vines and others can do it, why can’t we? Local Incubators In fact, neighborhood locations have always played an important role as incubators of new specialty retail concepts. Notable brands, …
New Revenue Streams, Higher Margins Are Walmart’s Focus
With a Walmart store within a 10-mile dash from every consumer in the U.S., and a split-second key tap away, they have clearly established a dominant retail position, saturating most of the country physically and accelerating its growth online. So, Wall Street says, “Great, but what have you done for me lately?” And since Walmart doesn’t rest on its laurels, their CFO, John Rainey, speaking at a recent Raymond James Conference, said, “the company expects a higher percentage of its sales and profits to shift to ad sales, third-party …
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Insights for Retail Innovators from Shoptalk
Identifying the critical trends that are shaping retail (short- and long-term) is an art supported by science. And that’s what Shoptalk does every year to build insightful content to guide retail executives in navigating an unpredictable, dynamic digital marketplace. All retail, whether legacy physical brands or the digital natives, face the same macro issues that keep everyone awake at night. The operations that once separated legacy from digital brands have merged, and it takes some brave, bold, and innovative thinking to chart the course …