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Retail Paradox Weekly
Retail News Analysis by RSR Research
August 4, 2009
There Is a Big Green Bus Out There, and Walmart Drives It: The Question Is, Are You Getting On?
By Steve Rowen, Managing Partner
8/4/2009
In an article in the New York Times last week, green leader Walmart was called out once again for its groundbreaking efforts in the field of ecologically-friendly retailing. Just a few weeks ago, we noted some of the company’s more recent environmentally-based undertakings, including its announcement that all of its suppliers will soon have to provide the full carbon impact of every product it sells; this “rating” will shortly be customer-facing information that rides right alongside every product’s price in Walmart stores.
This time, however, the initiative for which Walmart is making waves pertains to... More
Social Media Hits the Big-Time (Now Lawyers Are Watching)
By Brian Kilcourse, Managing Partner
8/4/2009
The July 31, 2009 San Francisco Chronicle ran a big story[1] on an emerging danger from using social media like Twitter to express your displeasure: defamation lawsuits. It had to happen. The U.S. Constitution’s 1st Amendment right of free speech doesn’t mean that anyone can say anything (unless of course it’s about a politician). In 1964, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that opinions could not be considered defamatory. But the law differentiates between a “statement of values” vs. “statements of alleged fact.” And that’s where the danger lies for opinionated tweeters. If there is any good news in this kind of scrutiny, it’s that it signals that social media has arrived – in a big way.
So now we know that lawyers are interested, but will retailers... More
Buying for Margin Rather than Assortment
By Paula Rosenblum, Managing Partner
8/4/2009
In our continuing quest to understand what Winning Retail strategies will look like this holiday season, and the potential impact of a possible CIT collapse, we spoke with two different people last week, Gary Edwards, EVP of Empathica, a company that helps retailers measure and manage the customer experience through web surveys and exit interviews, and Richard Hastings, CCE, Consumer Strategist for Global Hunter Securities, LLC.
We ended up spending far less time talking about CIT than we did talking about... More
Copyright © 2009 RSR Research LLC. RSR is a tradename of Retail Systems Research LLC. All Rights Reserved
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