Tag: customer service
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Lush: Creating Communities and always in Conversation
Lush: Creating Communities and always in Conversation Even those customers who would never consider crossing the threshold of a Lush store, never mind investing in a bath-bomb or a slice of specialist soap, are charmed and engaged by the customer experience they find. I’ve accompanied many clients and colleagues to stores and what astounds them…
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Retail & the Circular Economy: Square Pegs in a Round Whole?
Retailers can learn from the Circular Economy by becoming communities and not just sequences of job functionality. Positive actions & interactions stimulate others. Waste is minimised. Waste of resources, products and of time. And the waste of people – their energy, goodwill, knowledge, ideas and enthusiasm. I have to say that the concept of the…
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Generous retailing: A little goes a long way!
Generous retailing: A little goes a long way! Take 2 petrol stations, located only 100 metres apart. Let’s say for example BP and Shell. They are both recently refurbished with spacious forecourts and shiny new stores. They both collaborate with recognised retailers appealing to a similar customer. Let’s also say Marks & Spencer & Waitrose.…
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The Golden Age of Retail Personalisation: 100 years ago
Lest we get ahead of ourselves and think that we have invented the retail wheel through our technological mastery its worth reflecting that certainly up until today the golden era of retail personalisation was in a time before even H.G. Wells envisaged the role that computers would play in our lives. And should we consider…
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“Selling other Peoples’ Stuff! Is it the end of Generic Retailers?
So what are the common threads amongst many of the retailers suffering in the current market climate? They’re certainly well publicized. Of course there are the issues with over-sized expensive store portfolios, a slowness to embrace omnichannel, a lack of consumer confidence and a dearth of disposable income…but certainly at the epicenter of the…
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“Spoil you Staff with Space!” and “Your Space with Staff!”
Many discussions I have been having recently on allocating space within stores. The whole model is changing from those large product areas, static stockrooms, over-spaced or unruly queuing areas and pitiful backroom facilities for staff to one that reflects not only the requirements of the shopper but in fact what generates the income. Or…
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How Much of your Retail Space should be Allocated to your Staff?
Retail professionals are under extreme pressure to deliver what they always have, but now in a retail landscape that is being transformed by changing customer behaviour and a migration of retail sales to e-commerce, questions that have never had to be faced before are now becoming uncomfortably relevant… I have witnessed some unseemly “scraps”…
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Death of the Salesman: Long Live Retail!
Over the years, I have been in many meetings and discussions where the question has been asked…”What’s the difference between sales & marketing?” My best explanation is that in fact, it is the same process but approached from different perspectives. To coin the introduction from many a hackneyed joke…”A man goes into a shop…and…
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The White Company: Living life in the Soft Lane!
There surely cannot be a better example of why online retailing will never replace the physical store than The White Company. The recent opening of the extension of Westfield London sees the latest incarnation of the home retailer, now lifestyle retailer, inviting the customer to literally dive into the sumptuous textures and fabrics that make-up…
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The 2 different ways to encourage customers to spend
Do your retail sales blow hot & cold? Well, with the sun shining today in the UK and for most, at least, the winter snow receding into memories if not from the balance sheets, it reminds me of a more than relevant story. Anyone remember the tale from when they were younger about the…
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