The Chief Merchant Journal

A new drinking game – take a shot anytime someone in retail mentions the term “customer-centric.” Or some variation thereof. "Put the customer in the center of all decision making” …

Re-think speed to market. Instead, look at Velocity to Market. In physics, speed has no direction. It’s simply a number. A measure. Of distance over time. But... Velocity has a…

As a retail buyer, my vendors loved me. Buying appointments were a breeze. Vendors didn’t have to show physical samples of items already proven to be top sellers or the…

KPMG recently published its Retail Executive Outlook for 2023. 71% of retail executives are prioritizing supply chain efficiency for this year. How will they accomplish this? Their top priority to…

Exceptional retail merchants possess these three traits: They know who their customer is. Thus, they know how to serve them with the product they want. They know how to curate…

The typical retail end-to-end process can be visualized, simply, as a line. This makes sense, the end-to-end is very much a linear process. As such, visibility into the product journey…

Retailers use loyalty programs to keep customers coming back to them more often and spend more when they do. There is one more layer to this. Loyalty is about forsaking…

Products don’t tell stories. People do. Product assortments shouldn't be telling stories - rather, they must have a distinct point of view. It reflects what the brand stands for. There…