Category: analytics
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How quickly is your business able to act and to change?
As we all know retailing is a very dynamic beast. And the rate of change just keeps accelerating with new operating models, technologies, assortment supply chains, and voracious customer appetites showing no sign of slowing down. Be honest. How well are you able to react and change to customer demands and the retail markets around…
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The ‘Phantom Thread.’ The most valuable technology of our modern lives?
in analytics, assortment structure planning, disruptive retail, ethical retailing, internationalisation, ladies fashion, luxury, menswear, new retail, personalisation, pre-loved, product suppliers, re-sell, recycling, renting, retail, retail businesses, retail strategy, secondhand, supply-chains, sustainability, technology & electricalLet’s be clear. Sooner or later, either through choice, customer sentiment, or legislation, we will all be selling less things. Certainly as ‘retailers as a whole’ and, as individual businesses. This will be the ‘Journey of a lifetime’ for a retail industry built on volume growth, and a distinct change of direction for the journeys…
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Marks & Spencer shows that retailing is ‘A game of two halves!’
in analytics, assortment structure planning, branding & visual communication, customer experience, food & drink, health & beauty, high street planning, home, in-store services, ladies fashion, meaning in the retail madness, menswear, multi-category, omni-channel retailing, retail, retail brand heritage, retail businesses, retail management, retail organisations, retail strategy, retail-regeneration, store experience, store layout, store theatre, visual merchandisingIt has been an interesting few years for Marks & Spencer, and a month of vindication for its commercial strategy as it once again returned to the FTSE Top 100 of the UK’s largest businesses. It’s digital-first strategy has seen it put its customer, and it’s knowledge of the customer at the heart of everything…
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Anyone can sell more by reducing the price, but only the wise make money from it!
There’s a lot more to price than reducing it, even when we are living in a ‘Cost of Living Crisis!’ And in fact the clever thing is not to reduce prices, but to avoid reducing them. It is a route that is more difficult and more longer-team to achieve but it offers a sustainable strategy…
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How do retailers get better? The art and science of ‘looking inside’ and of ‘looking outside!’
in analytics, assortment structure planning, customer-engagement, in-store services, meaning in the retail madness, omni-channel retailing, packaging, retail, retail businesses, retail management, retail organisations, retail strategy, sales promotions & events, store layout, store operations, supply-chains, VManalyticsWhen we look at what we do, as commercially viable and successful retailers, there is no great mystery. The functions that we must address largely span developing a product assortment, building a supply chain, developing shops, e-commerce, and routes to market, manning everything from head office to stores with competent and loyal employees, and then…
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It is simply ‘Common Sense’ to balance ‘Artificial intelligence’ with Retail People.
in analytics, assortment structure planning, branding & visual communication, brave-words, customer experience, customer-engagement, disruptive retail, meaning in the retail madness, new retail, personalisation, retail, retail businesses, retail management, retail organisations, retail strategy, shop of the future, technology & electricalAnother day, and another AI (Artificial Intelligence) story. It would seen that necessity is overtaking novelty if the volume of copy is anything to go by, even if the specific needs are still often very much in the cloud. Undoubtedly recent history will repeat itself, with investment and popular hysteria chasing the latest billion dollar…
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We can not rely on lower inflation to bring our customers back.
Let us hope that the predictions of lower inflation and reduced interest rates have become a reality by the time you read this post. The omens are good. In the traditional cycle of things our customers regularly go through times of financial hardship and relative freedom to spend. It is just a matter of managing…
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“Meet your wardrobe of 2028!” – It has more Second-hand than Fast-fashion
in accessories, analytics, assortment structure planning, brave-words, disruptive retail, ethical retailing, fashion accessories, fast fashion, footwear, internationalisation, ladies fashion, leisure & sport, meaning in the retail madness, menswear, multi-category, new retail, omni-channel retailing, product suppliers, pureplay, recycling, renting, retail, retail businesses, retail management, retail organisations, retail strategy, supply-chains, sustainability, value retailing“Meet your wardrobe of 2028!” – It has more Second-hand than Fast-fashion I love this chart! It was produced using Globaldata research and is now 5 years old. It predicts what types of retailer our fashion wardrobe will be bought from in 5 years-time, in 2028. What an appropriate time to revisit it, mid-way through…
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What makes a customer love a retailer? It is about keeping your promises!
Retail Week has published its annual list of the most-loved retailers in the UK. Interestingly if you are looking for big picture trends relating to product sectors, or types of retailers, you will struggle to discover any conclusive findings. Understandably retailers that deliver low prices are very well represented in the cost-of-living climate, but by…
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Why Local Shopkeepers have more ‘Retail Intelligence’ than retail multiples!
Disruptive pureplay retailers have brought about an essential change to traditional business structures and processes. Well, ones that have watched and have quickly learned themselves. Best practice retail businesses now put the customer and customer data at the heart of the business. Customer centric & data centric. Everyday processes and new initiatives begin and end…
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