Online retailer Zappos is planning to introduce customizable web pages, and that has attracted all kinds of commentary - warm & welcoming as well as dismissive. The big question is "what is the customization and how it is being offered". My rule is simple: web-page customization has to drive simplification of the shopping experience. Changing skins, page layout, and other cosmetic stuff may keep novelty-seekers happy - for some time, that is. But the average user will find that it is just another thing too many on the already over-full to-do list. Simplification of the user-friendly sort has to be…
Cisco's John Chambers is calling the current economic scenario "the biggest opportunity of our lifetime", and asking managers to shift from a centralised approach to a more collaborative one. Of course, Cisco as a company has much to gain from the growth of collaborative network organisational models, but he does have a point. But will it be simple to make that shift? After decades, maybe centuries, of command-and-control behaviour training from kindergarten, it will take more than a few months for people to learn how to collaborate. Remember the management adage: "Lead, be led or get out of the way"?…
The internet seems to be as much alien territory for bricks and mortar retailers as catalogues are. Bricks and mortar retailers seem to struggle with the medium - most of them try to graduate from their corporate web brochures to transaction sites, and end up doing injustice to both. Many of them are not able to figure out how to create the traffic to their online store, how to create the excitement and liveliness to convert their traffic into transactions, and how to take the transactions to their final closure in terms of payment and delivery in a delightful way. Of…
In the last few months, I’ve interacted with retailers and their suppliers from a number of countries in North America, Europe and Asia and, except for a handful, the conversations have not been happy. In November-December companies in France, Belgium, Germany and the United Kingdom were dealing with a season where there was as much red on the P&L statements as in the Christmas shop windows. In January 2009, the National Retail Federation’s annual convention in New York had participation that was somewhat thinner than in past years, but the gloom in the atmosphere was thick enough to slow everyone…
Business Standard BS Reporters Mumbai February 11, 2009, 0:31 IST Kishore Biyani-owned Pantaloon Retail's same-store sales in January grew at the second slowest pace in five years as consumers curbed spending and the retailer struggled to survive the downturn by offering discounts. The slow growth comes after the retailer's value and lifestyle same-store sales registered a negative growth in December. Pantaloon's same-store sales in the value retailing segment climbed 4 per cent in the month of January after dropping 4 per cent in December. Lifestyle sales grew 12 per cent in the month after declining 14 per cent in the…
Speciality Restaurants expanding into high-margin QSR and cloud kitchen spaces - @devangshu shared his perspective on the opportunities and realities of managing a diverse "house of brands" in the food service sector #India #strategy #diversification
Geopolitical friction has again sparked renewed concerns over inflation and rising input costs for FMCG companies as @itmeansjustice @whysnavi write. @devangshu commented.
