Posts Tagged ‘retail trends’

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The Enduring Allure of the Secret Handshake

Thursday, January 20th, 2011

By Doug Stephens

The world is an increasingly inclusive place and as a society, we’ve grown to expect equal and open access to just about everything.  Facebook has become the ultimate online commune.  Anyone can jump on a Groupon deal.  There are no requisites to joining Foursquare, Flickr or almost any other web based social community.  In fact, the web in general has in many ways become the truest expression of the idea of equal access and egalitarianism – the democratization of everything.

Exclusivity Works

But let’s also not forget when high school kids were lying about their age just to get a Facebook profile because Facebook was exclusively for college students?    It could be argued that those early barriers to entry are what fuelled the mystique and excitement around Facebook.  Membership became coveted and cherished.

The truth is that we like exclusivity.  We prize gaining access to places that others can’t.   We relish having privileges that others don’t enjoy.  We all long to know “the secret handshake” that takes us where others can’t go.

That’s why I believe we’re poised to see a gradual but steady shift toward a decidedly less inclusive web.  This is not to say communities like Facebook won’t continue to grow but that people will slowly begin to seek deeper, more valuable and ultimately more exclusive communities to belong to.

In fact, the evolution of exclusion is already underway with a number of communities requiring certain criteria of their membership.  Path.com, for example, calls itself a “personal site” that limits users to linking with a maximum of 50 friends.  Collegeonly.com, picks up where Facebook began by creating a social network exclusively for college students.  A Small World, has been called “MySpace for millionaires”. There’s even a site for beautiful people, aptly named beautifulpeople.com, where user’s photographs are actually voted on prior to being granted access.  That’s right, no ugly people allowed!

A Shift Retailers Should Heed

One of my favorite sayings when it comes to trends is “Don’t look at the finger, look at where it’s pointing.”  In other words, while sites like beautifulpeople.com may strike us as nothing more than tasteless elitism, they point to the underlying human need to feel special, unique and valued via exclusive membership.  Something we don’t see a great deal of in retail.

Retailers on the other hand have inundated us with free memberships and loyalty programs.  It seems that every retailer has a program and just about anyone can join them.  There’s no cost or prerequisite to becoming a member and not surprisingly the benefits are often disappointing.  As a consequence, we begin to shy away from loyalty programs altogether.  After all, if anyone qualifies, how valuable can it really be?

Some brands like Starbucks and Lululemon have hinted at a sense of exclusivity by creating a strong culture complete with their own product languages. Others, like Neiman Marcus and Saks have excluded largely through pricing.  Even sites like Gilt Groupe and Rue La La have built their businesses on a by-invitation-only model – although getting an invitation isn’t a challenge.  Costco is perhaps the most exclusive with its flat-out membership fee.

I would argue, though, that there’s an opportunity to take the notion of exclusivity much farther, creating private customer communities that are so experiential, enjoyable and value- added that consumers would clamour for access.  Unlike more banal retail loyalty programs the potential exists to build members-only branded communities offering everything from social connections through to exclusive media, products and even live events.  Imagine belonging to a branded social network so exclusive and valuable you’d be willing to pay to belong!

This runs completely contrary to the D.N.A of many marketers who have come to regard success as providing reasonable value to as many people as possible.  In exclusive communities by contrast, success lies in creating enormous value for only your very best or most influential customers…the chosen few as it were.  It means creating deep brand experiences for some instead of shallow brand experiences for all.

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Posted in Advertising, Behavioral Marketing, Branding, Marketing, social media, Trends

Reconstructing Retail: 2011 and Beyond

Sunday, January 9th, 2011

By Doug Stephens

Unfortunately, the future isn’t as simple as the headlines might have us believe.  It can’t be neatly summed up in the words recession or recovery.  Recovery in particular, suggests a return to a previous (and presumably healthier) state, which really isn’t the case here.  There is no returning to the way things were.  Instead what we face is a fundamental reconstruction; a reconstruction of the American economy, a reconstruction of the American workforce and ultimately a reconstruction of the American competitive advantage.  Only once this painful transition is complete is real and sustained prosperity possible.

In particular, there are three interdependent factors that will require correction in order for any meaningful economic reconstruction to take place.

Corporate Investment

If you examine the markets where companies are investing for growth, you’ll quickly get a sense of the emerging global economic order.

Wal-mart for example, whose results have been eerily flat in the United States is investing in and growing at a staggering rate in China.  And they’re not alone.  Increasingly, North American companies are investing heavily in rapidly developing foreign economies.

Once the incubator for cutting edge concepts in retail marketing and store design, the U.S. is now taking a

back seat to markets like Asia, Russia, India and South America.  Instead U.S. retailers are recalibrating for a sustained period of flat to moderate domestic growth.  Smaller store concepts in denser, urban markets will steadily become the norm as changes in consumption, population distribution and rising energy costs challenge the profitability of the sprawling suburban power mall model.  Service-based businesses, community agencies and other non-traditional tenancies will increase their presence in enclosed regional malls, as America sheds retail square footage in search of equilibrium with demand.

When you take into account that the United States is already over-retailed by anywhere from 25 to 50 percent, it’s going to mean a massive domestic downsizing and redirection of investment into emerging retail markets.  So, while profits at places like Wal-Mart might continue to grow, the average American will no longer be the beneficiary.  Simply put, America is no longer the cradle of retail innovation or investment.

Employment

As corporations increasingly invest outside the U.S. it can’t help but add to domestic unemployment woes.  Furthermore, count on a brain drain of epic proportions as talented American business people follow employment opportunities to emerging nations.

What’s also concerning is the high rate of unemployment among recent college graduates – arguably the consumers of tomorrow – which is projected to worsen as we move through the current decade.  The inability to employ our best educated citizens is a real problem.

Even those fortunate enough to have employment will make continued sacrifices as bonuses, increases and benefits are increasingly reined in. The bottom line is that as long as there remains uncertainty around employment and income growth, true and sustained economic recovery is nothing short of impossible.

Housing

Currently, the market in most states continues to search for bottom with the most recent figures pointing to an unexpected average decline of 1.3% in home prices across 20 major markets, according to a S&P/Case-Shiller report, which some analysts even believe might be optimistic. And with unemployment hovering at or near the 10% mark into 2011 home prices will continue to plumb the depths.

Once the market does in fact reach “bottom”, the return to pre-recession values could be protracted.  If we assume real estate appreciation at historic norms of around 3 percent per annum, it could be at least 10 years in some markets before prices reach 2005 levels.

For older homeowners who were banking on their equity to fund retirement, this is potentially devastating and will continue to fuel the current saving spree.

Surviving the Reconstruction

So if you’re waiting for a recovery, you could be here a while.

The good news is that the reconstruction is well underway and retailers who understand the difference will survive it.

Yoga and athletic apparel retailer lululemon for example continues to take North America by storm.  Nordstrom consistently posts solid results. Apple continues to generate line-ups outside their stores.  At the other end of the market, Dollar General continues to impress with outstanding growth.

While being very different companies, they have one important thing in common; a distinct and own-able position in their market.  For lululemon it’s a winning combination of quality made clothing and an inspiring corporate culture built around Eastern philosophy.  For Nordstrom it’s their unwavering attention to superior service and for Apple it’s brilliantly designed products, backed with a unique store experience.  At Dollar General it’s a pursuit of low prices that makes Wal-Mart look like slackers.

These companies and others like them have not allowed fear of the recession to distract them from what makes them strong.  They haven’t let it water down their brand propositions.  They don’t try to be things that that they’re not.  They know who they are.

Winning retailers like these understand that they can no longer count on a rising tide of economic prosperity to lift their ship.  Those days are gone.  Instead, they have to invent a market where no market exists and steal market share where it does.

They know there’s no longer a free pass to the future.  In fact the price of admission is steep.  Getting through the doors of the future means being coveted, loved and above all, being remarkable.

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Posted in Behavioral Marketing, Branding, Marketing, Shopper Marketing, Store Experience, The Future, Trends

Speaking of the Future…

Thursday, September 30th, 2010

By Doug Stephens

I had the pleasure  of being a guest on the Competitive Futures podcast series.  Competitive Futures, based in St. Louis was founded by Eric Garland, author of the book Future Inc. and highly respected authority on intelligence and futures analysis. Eric and I spent the better part of an hour talking about some of the big stuff that will be changing the shape of retailing in the future.

Our chat is broken out below into 4 parts.  Enjoy!

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

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Posted in Marketing, Podcasts, The Future, Trends

Augmented Reality: The Impending Battle for Digital Real Estate

Thursday, September 23rd, 2010

Imagine this….

You drive a moving van outfitted with retail fixtures, signs, a cash register and loads of jewellery up Fifth Avenue in Manhattan, park directly in front of Tiffany & Co. You swing open the doors and start selling to the throngs of people passing by.  You make a fortune and never pay a penny in wages or rent.  Best of all there’s nothing Tiffany can do to stop you.   Sound preposterous?  In the physical world it would be but in the world of augmented reality it’s entirely possible and to a growing extent, it’s happening.

What is Augmented Reality?

Augmented reality is the layering of digital information onto real life objects and places.  These digital content layers are then viewable with computers or smartphones and may take the form of text, video, or images.  While still very

Augmented reality kiosks in the Lego store

much in its infancy, examples of augmented reality are turning up sporadically in the consumer market.  Lego for  example, has incorporated the technology into some of its packaging, allowing consumers to not only see what a particular Lego box contains but also to view a moving virtual model of the completed set via in-store monitors.

When Digital and Physical Worlds Collide…

Location-based augmented reality requires that the user actually be in a particular location in order to interact with the digital content positioned there.  With some basic web programming skills, almost anyone can create digital content and place it just about anywhere in the physical realm, including some of the most prestigious shopping avenues in the world.  French clothing brand Hostage Wear for example has opened over 20 A/R shops in some of the world’s best known venues including Piccadilly Circus, Red Square, Venice Beach and Madison Square Park.

Protecting Your Augmented Real Estate

All this raises some mind-bending questions about the eventual meeting point between digital content and physical location.   As augmented reality increases in usage, could we see potential turf wars between physical retail businesses and digital businesses vying for consumer attention in the same locations?  Could this collision of the real and the virtual test the definition of what constitutes real estate?

One of over 20 augmented reality shops worldwide by French brand Hostage Wear. This one is located in Amsterdam's Rietland Park

“I look forward to these kinds of challenges” says Maarten Lens-Fitzgerald, co-founder of Layar, a pioneer in the field of mobile augmented reality. “It will mean that the virtual space is valuable.”  Layar currently has one million active users world-wide and according to Mr. Lens-Fitzgerald is growing at a dramatic pace.  With over 3000 Layar developers worldwide, the potential for rapid escalation in the number of augmented reality projects is significant.

So, could we see a time where digital space associated with a specific location is bought and sold like physical real estate?  From Lens-Fitzgerald’s point of view the answer is no. Given that there are no limits to the amount of digital content that can be associated with a particular location; he does not foresee digital space having the same finite characteristics as real estate.  However, he does see augmented reality advertising space being sold in and around specific high traffic geographic locations.

Start Now

And what can retail brands do to stake out the digital space around their locations?  Lens-Fitzgerald’s advice is “Not to approach the issue from a defensive position”.  He maintains that brands should be developing augmented reality experiences now.  Even if they don’t have the longer-term strategy in place, they should at least begin developing an approach.  He points out that with the advent of mobile applications that organize nearby A/R content according to popularity and relevance, low quality A/R content and experiences will simply fall to the bottom of the list.  In the end, he maintains, whoever “owns the best A/R experience” will win.

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Posted in Marketing, Technology, The Future, Trends

Who Needs Retail Anyway?

Monday, September 13th, 2010

By Doug Stephens

If we’ve learned anything from the advent of online social networks, it’s that ordinary people can be quickly organized around a common idea, cause or event more effectively than ever before.  Whether it’s to monitor urban polling stations during elections, aid earthquake victims or simply flash-mob on a city street corner, our ability to rally people, for any purpose, is unprecedented, which raises an ominous question for retail.

If it’s that simple to coordinate attention, interest and effort, how difficult could it be to harness consumer buying power?

It’s also become abundantly clear is that our need for middle-men is quickly diminishing.  Disintermediation is occurring all around us – in music, publishing and even advertising – so why not retail?

The Groupon Incident

August 19th, 2010 may go down in retail history as the day the game changed.  It was on this otherwise uneventful day, that an estimated half-million people jumped on an unexpected GAP promotion offered through online deal-maker Groupon, crashing Groupon’s server in the process and shocking the retail world.  And while the lead story understandably touted this as a win for the retailer, the real wake-up call had more to do with the power of the consumer and the ease with which so many of them could have their collective buying power amassed so quickly.

Beyond Coupons

The idea of consumers coming together to combine their purchasing power is not new.  As early as 2006 we heard reports out of China of hoards of consumers coordinating online and descending  on retailers at a specific time to essentially extort discounts from them.  But as social networks become increasingly ubiquitous and sophisticated, the ability for consumers to coordinate their respective needs and organize in an effective way is clearly a reality, especially on major purchases such as appliances, electronics or automobiles, where the savings can be significant. And to be clear, I am not referring to the kind of direct-buying clubs often seen on television which are really only a slightly different layer of retail distribution.  Rather I’m talking about one hundred percent, consumer generated buying groups – by the people for the people so to speak.

For example, suppose 500,000 consumers wishing to buy appliances come together within a social buying network.  And of those, the 200,000 wanting refrigerators form a sub-group. And within the sub-group, the 10,000 consumers wanting a Sub-Zero model 123 form a buying group and make a direct offer to the manufacturer for all 10,000 units.  What manufacturer could simply walk away from an offer like that, especially when there’s 100 percent retail markup in their pocket to play with?

What’s particularly worrisome for retailers is that this social buying group could have more collective purchasing clout than they do!

Why Retail in the First Place?

A Retailer’s value used to be in their ability to amass selected assortments of goods that consumers would otherwise have little or no access to.  Secondly, they displayed the products in a way that made selection less time consuming. Lastly, they supported the assortment with valuable product knowledge – knowledge that was unavailable to consumers.   In other words, the Retailer added real, tangible value to the product in the process of selling it to the consumer.  They earned their cut.

However, given the access to information that today’s Consumer has, this value is increasingly being diminished.  To an ever -growing extent, the consumer doesn’t need the retailer.   After all, how do you adequately serve a consumer who knows more about your products than you do?  From the Consumer’s point of view many stores have become little more than expensive ship-to points.

The Key to Survival

Retailers that do manage to survive the inevitability of consumer-direct buying will be those who firmly re-establish their added value.  Beyond product, price or promotion, they will deliver something unique, difficult to replicate and above all, something of real worth to the consumer.  They’ll deliver an experience.  An experience that’s well worth the mark-up.

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Posted in Behavioral Marketing, Marketing, social media, The Future, Trends

What if it all STARTS with the purchase?

Wednesday, August 11th, 2010

By Joel Rubinson

Traditional marketing theory tells us that the purchase is the successful outcome of consumer-directed messages that create awareness which begets interest, desire, and action.

What happens when that is wrong?  What does marketing do when it STARTS with the purchase?

This is an extreme version of what Procter calls “store back”.  However, based on shopper insights research I have conducted, I believe that, for grocery products, over half of first-time purchases are unplanned; in fact, the shopper might not even have been aware of the product before buying it.  In those cases, it all STARTS with the purchase and ENDS with awareness.  The purchase funnel is totally flipped.

When it all starts with the purchase, the role of marketing communications changes.  Now marketing must get the product noticed at shelf and impart meaning to it instantaneously for the shopper.  Packaging, shelf placement, thematic displays, signage, mobile messages that are location-aware, shopper offers based on that shopper’s history, and master brand familiarity become the main vectors for creating meaning.  In this communications model, when someone encounters a product they were unfamiliar with they should be able make sense of it instantly; to tell YOU (the marketer) what the product is about, rather than you having to tell them in a concept statement.  After the product is bought and being used, there is more sense-making that occurs.  If the consumer is really into the product as they are using it, now you have an opportunity to build engagement:  they might join a community, become a fan in Facebook, share comments, start seeking out advertising and recalling it, seek out the brand’s “creation story”, etc.  In this scenario, the impact of brand narrative, brand values, social media engagement, etc. come AFTER the purchase, so they solidify rather than precondition the brand-customer relationship.

Could it really be that it all starts with the purchase?  Well, for certain types of products and retailing situations, I believe it does.  Consider this:

  • - Conduct a study to measure the percent of products bought for the first time that are discovered in-store (I got 50%+)
  • – Do you think the products bought for the first time on impulse in a Kroger’s, Trader Joes, Costco, Target, etc. are all the same and were previously known? If not, then you believe that brand adoption can START via the shopping experience.
  • - Consider shopping styles that people have, reflecting their relationship with a product category.  Can you imagine categories (e.g. artisan cheeses) where shoppers like to explore and find new interesting products to buy?

This last point is perhaps the most important.  People have different shopping styles for different product categories which means that the heuristics they use to make decisions are systematic.  You might not ever buy carbonated soft drinks the way you buy interesting dips that you just tried at a tasting station.  This is where behavioral economics intersects marketing; the study of how people decide is often more interesting than theoretical purchase intentions.  Hence, some products will predominantly be bought via a process that starts in-store.  Others will be bought based more on the traditional marketing model requiring awareness built via mass media. You need to study HOW people decide in order to understand when to start from the traditional end of the funnel and when you start from the other end of the funnel.

When it all STARTS with the purchase, everything that you thought was upstream becomes downstream and the thing that was the most downstream of all, the purchase, becomes the most upstream event.

This is “store back” on steroids.

Now, the researcher in me has to ask the rhetorical question, “Does the marketing community have the research tools to act on this new way of thinking?”  Rhetorical because, I don’t think we do.

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Joel Rubinson is a distinguished expert in consumer and market research and the President of Rubinson Consulting. He can be reached at joelrubinson@gmail.com

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Posted in Behavioral Marketing, Branding, Marketing, Store Experience, Trends

The Problem With What You Do Best

Monday, August 2nd, 2010

By Doug Stephens

One of the first lessons I was taught in marketing was that when times were tough and sales were hard to come by, smart companies focussed on their core business.  They didn’t chase unproven concepts and ideas or explore unfamiliar ground.  Rather, they drilled even further into their primary occupation.  They “stuck to what they did best”.

I know now that nothing could be more untrue and that this pseudo-strategy has probably killed more companies than it’s salvaged.  And yet, we regularly hear CEO’s declare that they’re re-trenching around their core business in an effort to succeed.

When your core business IS the problem

The problem with simply focusing on your core product in tough times is that your core product might actually be what is making times tough in the first place. Focusing more intently on it  may only speed your demise!  Any creative or innovative thinking that could actually save the company is often stifled once the stick to what you do best mentality becomes pervasive.  Revolutionary ideas rarely see the light of day.

For the Apple’s and Google’s of the world, radical innovation is a daily breakfast item but the companies I truly admire are the ones for whom innovation is a painful leap of faith.  One can’t help but respect companies who have the courage to look outside their comfort zone for answers to seemingly insurmountable problems.

Below are what I consider to be three great examples of companies that chose NOT to stick to what they already know when times got tough but instead stretched to find new points of connection with their customers and in doing so, charted new territory for their brands.

Core Business WAS: Manufacturing a brand of automobile with little relevance, equity or appeal with young consumers.

What they DID: Instead of focussing on the automobile itself, Ford invested in Sync, a Microsoft designed system that seamlessly integrates phone, text messaging, web browsing and music through the car’s voice activated communication system.  Since its introduction in 2007, Ford has sold more than 2 million Sync enabled vehicles and claims that Sync-enabled models outsell non-Synch models twofold.

But the point here is really less about the technology and more about the message that Ford was sending to younger consumers.  In this decisive departure from its core product, Ford clearly told younger consumers that it “got them”.  The brand understood their need to integrate their personal technology into their driving experience and built a system that allowed them to do just that.

Core Business WAS: Manufacturing a low tech, old-fashioned toy in a market being increasingly dominated by video games.

What they DID:  Rather than waste effort trying to convince kids that plastic building blocks were cooler than video games, Lego reached beyond the safety of its core product, embracing the very technology that threatened its existence and making it part of the Lego experience.

The website offers video and online games, allowing kids to discover various Lego product sets in a fun and interactive way.Themed Lego kits correspond to popular movies, bridging the gap between passive entertainment and creative play.  They’ve also done a brilliant job of incorporating in-store technologies such as augmented reality to make the Lego buying experience truly exciting.

Core Business WAS: Making a brand of clothing that was being commoditized in the market and increasingly overlooked by younger consumers in favor of more fashion oriented, up-market brands.

What they DID:  Instead of focussing consumers on stitch-counts and pant styles,

Levis turned their attention to something well outside their core strength… music.  In 2010 they launched the Levis Pioneer recording sessions, a collection of 12 recordings by contemporary artists re-working classic songs that they’ve been inspired by.  The tracks and subsequent videos served as an allegorical bridge between the old and the new, a marrying of the classic and the contemporary.

Furthermore, it broke through the din of unremarkable messaging in the apparel market, sending a clear message to younger audiences that classic can indeed be cool.

Sticking to what you do best isn’t a strategy

These are only a few examples of brands that’ve had the courage to explore beyond their core.  There are others.  And in fairness, there are also a few notable examples of companies who did intensify their focus on their core offering to better serve their consumers – Starbucks being one of them.

But don’t let anyone convince you that simply sticking to what you do best constitutes a long-term strategy.  It’s more often the battle-plan of frightened business leaders who’ve simply run out of ideas.  They fail to realize that the core business of all great brands – regardless of what they sell – is innovation.

Innovation is what great businesses do best.

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Posted in Marketing, Technology

The Future Hates Mediocrity

Wednesday, February 17th, 2010

By Doug Stephens

I was reminded recently of a really good book I read several years ago called Going Shopping by Ann Satterthwaite, a city planner from Washington D.C. It’s an historical account of shopping formats through the ages- an archaeological dig, so to speak, into the evolution of retail.  Bored

It’s fascinating to see how various forms of retail moved in and out of consumer preference over the centuries.  What’s really worth noting though, is that every form of retail that has ever existed, continues to exist today, to some degree.

We still have some flea markets and bazaars in the world. The downtown department store, although not without challenges, soldiers on. The suburban mall concept continues today and is morphing into some unique and interesting lifestyle formats. Small, independent shops continue to account for a significant percentage of the total store count and of course e-commerce is thriving. So despite centuries of change and evolution, not a single form of retail trade has become extinct.

What is clear however is that only the strongest have survived and those that have managed to withstand the test of time have had one thing in common – they’ve been remarkable. Not necessarily remarkable at everything but definitely remarkable at something.

For Le Bon Marche in Paris, it may be the sheer beauty of the store design that set them apart. At Ritz-Carlton hotels, legendary service may be the differentiator. For the Grand Bazaar in Istanbul it might be its hyper-experiential environment and for the St. Lawrence market in Toronto, it could be the eclectic mix of people and products. 

Voltaire once said, “The perfect is the enemy of the good” and I’ve known some retail executives that have openly subscribed to this idea. They’ve suggested that in the pursuit of perfection we can impede progress towards an outcome that is sufficiently good. I don’t agree. I would argue that good is in fact, the enemy of survival. What’s notable about good? Good things happen to us every day and the following week we can’t recall one of them. Every day good businesses open and good businesses close. In some cases we don’t even notice that they’re gone. The truth is, good is mediocre and the future hates mediocrity. 

Try this… instead of setting out to be good at a lot of things, put your mind to being remarkable at something. The future likes remarkable.

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Posted in The Future, Trends

Luxury Retailers Hit the Panic Button

Friday, December 11th, 2009

By Doug Stephens

As the recession drags on, it’s become clear that few in the retail sector are being spared its wrath. In separate stories this week, New York icon Saks Fifth Avenue and super-luxe retailer Neiman Marcus conceded to just how bad the situation has become. 

With both chains bleeding double-digit sales and profit declines, strategic shifts are taking place that go to the very heart of their respective value propositions. These changes, unless carefully managed, could have lasting negative implications for both brands.

For example, the once venerable Saks is now using gift cards and lower priced merchandise to coax aspirational customers back to their stores. They also reported a 52 percent increase in their use of coupons, a sales tool that until recently was a foreign concept at Saks.

Neiman Marcus has likewise called for fundamental changes to its assortments in order to provide lower priced, entry point products for hesitant shoppers. The chains’ luxury vendors have been tasked with supplying lower cost versions of designer collections. As further incentive to buy, customers are being given extra points on their loyalty cards and gift cards for future purchases. To make matters worse, neither chain sees a quick recovery in sight and are in fact bracing for a long road back to pre-crisis sales levels.

The decision to move down-market will likely come as good news to that percentage of consumers who might not otherwise visit a Saks or Neiman Marcus. What’s less certain is the reaction of core customers – the elite shopper– without which, neither chain could have become what it is today.

While even discount pricing at Neiman Marcus or Saks is still well outside the means of the average American, it can’t help but to impact the air of exclusivity that surrounds their names. And if scarcity and exclusivity do in fact breed luxury, then one has to wonder if these chains are taking a dangerous step toward obscurity. As always, time will tell

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Posted in Branding, Marketing, Trends

The Courage to Let Go

Wednesday, September 30th, 2009

Recently I was invited to speak to a group of senior executives at a well established national retail company.  It’s a business steeped in tradition and admired for its values and commitment to its stores and its employees.   They admit however that proactive change is not something they’re widely reputed for.  Based on the fact that I am such an advocate of change, I didn’t know exactly what to expect going in.HANDS3

My presentation centered on how the needs of consumers, the nature of competition and the media are all shifting dramatically.  I discussed the many opportunities that are available to companies who embrace change and how they can capitalize on it.   A substantial part of the presentation focuses on the continued growth and importance of social networks and media for retailers.

At the end of the presentation I spoke to their Marketing Director who had been trying for months to implement a social media program.  He was clearly and understandably delighted to learn he had just gotten the CEO’s approval to finally go ahead with it. He thanked me and I congratulated him and told him that I admired his conviction. It takes courage to fight for what we believe in.

However, as I made my way out of the conference room I realized that the real courage that day was on the part of the company’s CEO.   Until now, he had, for whatever reason, been opposed to a social media program but today he allowed his position to change.  Sure it takes guts to stand up for what you believe in, but I think it takes even more courage to let go of what you believe in.   Divorcing yourself from a long-held belief is like throwing out your favorite pair of jeans – they may be a little dated and worn but they’re damn comfortable…far more comfortable than new ones.

Organizations rarely fail to adapt because their people didn’t realize the need for change.  On the contrary, it’s often the rank and file employees that are the most vocal proponents for change.  Ironically, it’s often because their leaders simply won’t let go of the past.  Consequently, they impede the organization’s ability to change.  It seems almost counterintuitive that leadership would stand in the way of progress but it’s often the case.  Change can be turbulent, chaotic and uncertain – three things many CEO’s (and the shareholders they answer to) don’t care for very much.

Strangely enough, the barrier to change isn’t a lack of people sticking to their guns.  It’s an overabundance of people sticking to their guns.  Yes, it takes courage to hold-on in the face of adversity but I maintain that it takes more courage to let go in the face of change.

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Posted in The Future

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