Retail Powerhouse

What is it about retail, particularly the grocery industry, that makes it so hard (apparently) to executre at a store level?

I’ve actually read several studies that suggest that having more people (i.e., better customer service) yields higher returns for retailers.

Think of Trader Joe’s. Think of Whole Foods. Think of HEB.

Then, why, do a lot of retailers lack the appropiate customer service and are so inefficient at store level execution?

Are they trapped in a vicious cycle?  How, if at all possible, can they get out?

There used to be a convenience store called ‘Store 24’ in the corner right in front of the apartment building where I currently live. For those of you who live in the East coast, you might have seen a few of them, but if you’re not familiar, just think of your typical mid-sized chain of convenience stores (c-stores).

They had a good operation, as far as I was concerned, and their store was just a good old regular c-store. One day though, they put up a sign saying they were going out of business and were closing their operations within the next few weeks. Fast forward a few weeks and Store 24 was gone. Few weeks went by, and much to my surprise, a new store settled in…

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After watching the 60 Minutes interview of Whole Foods CEO John Mackey, it got me into thinking of how much of a contrasting view there is between Mackey and, for the purposes of this example, Albertsons’ former CEO Larry Johnston.

Mackey made $430,000 last year (not counting any stock options) while Albertsons former CEO will pocket more than $100,000,000* in cash, stock, health and other benefits this year. This might be an unfair comparison, given that one takes into account one year’s salary and the other one takes compensation for the sale of the company… However, bear with me while I illustrate my point and get through my idea.

Technorati Tags: Whole Foods, Albertsons, CEO, compensation, retail

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I stumbled upon this site, grocerylists.org, which has a collection of over 1,000 scanned grocery lists that have been either randomly found or submitted to the site.

It’s interesting to see how the author took his initial idea and managed to create a big success out of it, to the point where the author is currently working on writing a book!

Here’s an example of one the lists:

And don’t forget: ‘Heart attack… Check’

Technorati Tags: grocery, Retail, Grocery, Supermarkets, Merchandising

Found a really interesting site of a photographer that takes 360 degree panoramic photographs, one of which was a photo of the Apple store in NYC. Enjoy!

http://www.panoramas.dk/newspanos/f20-apple-store.html

• Best: Target comps of 5.7%, beating analysts’ estimates of 4.8%, continued to outperform arch nemesis Wal-Mart
• Worst: Wal-Mart same-store sales of 2.3%, below analysts’ estimates of 2.9%. Who is to blame? Fuel prices, of course

• Best: JC Penney (11% comps), Federated (9.2%), Saks (1.1%) and TJ Maxx (4%)
• Worst: Gap (-6%, but to be honest, no surprises here), Pacific Sunwear (-2.6%) and Hot Topic (-3.5%)
• Last but not least, Sharper Image, with a -36% drop in same-store sales.

Good numbers across the board, particularly at the department stores who had been struggling for the past couple of months.

Wal-Mart continues to struggle to achieve Target’s pace, but new initiatives to target to the higher income consumer that shops the left side of the store (consumables) are under way, so we might see a shift in the months to come.