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Commentary and Discussion From the Retail Community
Is the Category Killer a Broken Model?
In the 1980s, the “category killer” arrived on the scene to waylay the retail landscape. But in many categories, their reign was short-lived. The fault for their failure was often…
Will Grocers Get a Contact High From New Recreational Pot Sales?
Depending on their positions on the matter, residents of Colorado and Washington have either been dreading or highly anticipating (sorry, the puns are impossible to avoid) the debut of the…
Apple Finds New Way to Bag Sales
In Japan, an annual post New Year tradition every Jan. 2 is “Fukubukuro,” when retailers hand out “lucky” or “mystery” grab bags full of unknown discounted merchandise. In a similar…
The RetailWire Christmas Commercial Challenge: The Final Vote
After nine weeks of one-on-one competitions, the time has come for the RetailWire community to vote on the one commercial that stood above the rest for 2013 holiday selling season…
Does Facebook Need Teens?
An extensive European study concluded that teens are abandoning Facebook in droves, in large part because their parents are now using the network. Should retailers be concerned about Facebook apparently…
Holiday’s Must-Have Gift — Gift Cards
For the seventh year in a row, gift cards rated as holiday shoppers’ most wanted gift, according to NRF’s 2013 holiday survey. Less impressive: total spending on gift cards was…
Are Easy Returns Online’s Achilles Heel?
With free shipping and other lenient return policies becoming common practice, as much as a third of all online sales gets returned, according to a report from the Wall Street…
The $30 Billion ORC Problem
ORC, which is defined by StopORC.org as: “Short for Organized Retail Crime. This refers to theft of retail products, generally from a retail establishment, by an organized, professional crime ring…
Bookstores Are Not Dead!
“Bookstores are not dead.” That was the exuberant tweet on December 24th from Strand Book Store, the iconic New York City institution, as it wrapped up a record holiday selling…
Post-Christmas Comes Early This Year
Retailers made a last ditch effort to salvage a lackluster final holiday week with “after Christmas” level pricing, but undoubtedly many shoppers have held out until after the holiday for…
Aldi Sets Coast to Coast Ambitions
Aldi last week announced plans to invest $3 billion to open 650 stores over the next five years, taking its total number of stores in the U.S. to almost 2,000…
Delays Ruins E-Christmas for Some
Thousands of holiday gifts failed to arrive by Christmas day due to shipping problems at UPS. Many online stores, which guaranteed arrival, took at least some of the blame. Will…
Would You Accept Target’s Apology?
In a statement as well as a YouTube video, Target CEO Gregg Steinhafel apologized to customers who were affected by a massive data breach, while multiple reports that bogus credit…
Data Driven Marketing: You Must Market Your Change … to Change Marketing
Pride, ownership, past efforts, comfort – there are lots of reasons why employees work so hard to shut down new ideas. But the biggest driver is fear of many forms,…
Crowds Lead to Anxiety Spending
A new university study finds that consumers in crowded environments tend to choose safety oriented products, are more risk averse, and are more persuaded by messages that focus on the…
Will Target Incident Stoke Data Breach Fears?
While consumers weren’t so freaked out over past data breaches at TJX Cos., Genesco Inc. or even Schnuck Markets, Target may be another story, with the theft of data from…
Merry Manipulation for Millennials
While older segments recognize that holiday sales ruses are how the game is played at this time of year, a new study shows that Millennials perceive retailers as actively trying…
Is Fighting Stereotypes Fair Play in Beauty Commercials?
The general consensus is that Pantene’s new ad, “Labels Against Women,” makes its point simply and clearly. But controversy comes around whether a shampoo maker should be making such a…
Target Protects Brick & Mortar Turf
Beyoncé surprised the music industry last Friday by releasing her new album exclusively on iTunes without any pre-release announcement, shattering digital records with 617,000 copies sold in three days. But…
Retailers Challenged by Racial Profiling Issues
Barneys and Macy’s have brought to the forefront of the American consciousness the issue of racial profiling by retailers relative to shrink, and, in the process, have placed a challenge…
Amazon’s Price Changing Machine
According to analysis by Profitero, a U.K.-based price intelligence firm, Amazon.com implemented more than 2.5 million price changes every day during the month of November. How much of an advantage…
