[et_pb_section admin_label=”section”][et_pb_row admin_label=”row”][et_pb_column type=”4_4″][et_pb_text admin_label=”Text” background_layout=”light” text_orientation=”left” use_border_color=”off” border_color=”#ffffff” border_style=”solid”]<\/p>\n
The Good News and The Bad News\u2026From Bentonville<\/p>\n
It\u2019s the holiday selling season and there\u2019s a lot of news in retail, especially from the center of the retail world in Arkansas. While there are many other stores to talk about, let\u2019s take a look at two stories worth considering.<\/p>\n
First the good news. Thanksgiving has come and gone and by now the 40 pounds of newsprint that landed in my driveway has made its way to the recycle bin. Of all the ads and inserts in my paper, I couldn\u2019t help but read one from cover to cover. It had the best photography, the right gift items, and probably the best prices. No it wasn\u2019t Target (as good as their ads always are). Penney\u2019s spent a lot, but looked like everyone else. Nordstrom, Macy\u2019s and Dillards looked like\u2014well, like department stores. The best of the batch, in my opinion, was a slick-looking 16-page standard insert from none other than Sam\u2019s Club. Great photography, heavy, quality stock, terrific items, subtle prices with not so subtle savings. Made me want to read every bit of copy and check every price. While you could argue was this vehicle incongruous with a warehouse club store, you couldn\u2019t argue with the creativity and the savings. Of course, Costco, as always, didn\u2019t run any advertising, but Sam\u2019s set the pace with this circular and I suspect resulted in far better performance than their parent discount chain.<\/p>\n
Which brings me to the bad news (unless you\u2019re Target or Kmart). First, as a consumer, I didn\u2019t feel the presence of Wal-Mart at all during the Thanksgiving week. I saw more of the spots from the union trying to break down the conditions of working for the world\u2019s largest retailer than I did from the store. Usually, a dominant player, I didn\u2019t even see a Wal-Mart preprint and the television was transparent. Maybe the new marketing gurus from Chrysler and Frito-Lay had them running ads in Real Simple or Field and Stream magazinea. The lack of any presence by the largest retailer makes you wonder what\u2019s happening in Bentonville. Obviously, from the sales results, consumers felt the same way.<\/p>\n
To me it\u2019s another example of this store trying to act like a packaged goods or automotive marketer and forgetting the sense of urgency that retail demands. The fact that they took their eye off the ball to conduct an 8-month agency review (who needed that anyway??), then selected one that really has no retail experience, then fired the key marketing exec from Chrysler and her assistant and then unbelievably started the agency review all over again. Something stinks here. Now they are going to waste another 8 months and countless marketing energy by renewing the search (oh, to be an agency search consultant!) I went into a Wal-Mart this weekend and I think they were as well merchandised as ever. The big difference was that there were no lines at the registers and that really worries me. How blind can they be to their problems? The great brand is in jeopardy.<\/p>\n
We will have to see how the Holidays finish for sales, but I hope the news at your company and home is all good . Happy Holidays\u2026<\/p>\n
[\/et_pb_text][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][\/et_pb_section]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
[et_pb_section admin_label=”section”][et_pb_row admin_label=”row”][et_pb_column type=”4_4″][et_pb_text admin_label=”Text” background_layout=”light” text_orientation=”left” use_border_color=”off” border_color=”#ffffff” border_style=”solid”] The Good News and The Bad News\u2026From Bentonville It\u2019s the holiday selling season and there\u2019s a lot of news in retail, especially from the center of the retail world in Arkansas. While there are many other stores to talk about, let\u2019s take a look at […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-513","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kenbanks.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/513","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kenbanks.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kenbanks.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kenbanks.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kenbanks.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=513"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.kenbanks.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/513\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":514,"href":"https:\/\/www.kenbanks.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/513\/revisions\/514"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kenbanks.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=513"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kenbanks.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=513"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kenbanks.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=513"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}