CPG’S RETAIL REALITY CHECK

THE FUNDAMENTAL TRUTHS ABOUT URGENT CHANGE CPG brands are feeling pretty good about now. COVID-created nesting becomes the new normal and suddenly Amazon’s US grocery sales pop 45%. People cook more, they clean more, they stock up more on everything from toys to tech, and take it from someone who works with a sugar brand,

WHEN ANALYSTS GO APE

There’s a bit of madness in retail marketers’ chase for numerical fortification: A desire to build arguments as impenetrable as Kevlar and as logical as an anal retentive Vulcan. This breakneck chase for certainly presumes that with an infinite data set, sharper algorithms, and predicative analytics, we can totally crack consumer behavior and drive retail

DELIVER US FROM SAMENESS

“I want my MTV” A single, clear, four-word mantra was all it took. Suddenly, MTV had forced reluctant cable service providers to include MTV in their line-ups through a consumer pull-through strategy. Fact is, consumers were already demanding more cable content, no different than hungry and busy families are demanding more food delivery options, but

DOWN THE RABBIT HOLE WE GO. Will The Up Fronts Ever Be The Same?

In the very time it takes to read this post, Amazon would have exceeded forecasts, Walmart would have countered with an acquisition or low cost delivery option, and between them, a trillion dollars of revenue would be hung up in Seattle and Bentonville. In fact, everything they do today, every move they make, is just

RETAIL’S SOS MOMENT

The irony is at once incredible and sad, really. With more data, big data, analytics, and data scientists at their beck and call, more brands simply do not understand their place in the world anymore. And while in many ways they are proverbial ships that are faster and more efficient than ever, they remain lost

REVENUE IS SERVED

It always, ALWAYS, comes down to three ingredients: Marketing, Ops, and People. The category’s definitive three-legged stool. Marketing’s responsibility has never been more complex or carried a heavier load. The competition is unrelenting and communication channels insanely diverse. And yet if you’re not driving traffic, you’re dead. Period. People: Ray Kroc’s famous quote says it all:

DATA’S 7 DEADLY SINS

While not quite as egregious as sloth perhaps, marketers are selling their MBA souls for numerical support, lest their gut be their downfall. And so data, and especially big data, is the new silver bullet. But whether silver, copper, gold or brass, a bullet is not the only weapon in the marketers’ arsenal. And a

SUDDENLY RED FRIDAY: WHY RETAILERS ARE ADDICTED TO THE WRONG DAY.

You would think that 51 Fridays in the red and one in the black isn’t the kind of “high” a retailer could get behind. Yet sacrificing margin for volume and getting myopic about shopper frenzy, most retailers once again placed all their bets on black last week because… hey, isn’t it the busiest shopping day

URBAN OUTFITTERS MISS THE TARGET AND STRIKE A NERVE.

When a brand uses a marketing tactic so salacious, so outrageous, that the first thing you ask your self is “am I missing something”, you know that brand has pushed the boundaries too far. And so, today, Philadelphia’s Urban Outfitters is forced to apologize and defend itself in the face of an egregious miscalculation. Consider

BEHOLD THE ROI OF THE POWER CHORD.

So just because there are plenty of guys out there who know who Buckethead is and who define street cred as the ability to master sweep arpeggios, is that enough to keep a business like Guitar Center strumming along in cash? No. But that shouldn’t stop them. For musicians, a brick and mortar music store