Consumer Insights

Consumer Insights
Don’t Blame Poor Sales On A Warm Winter
January 20, 2016

The 2015 holiday shopping season might go down as one that pulled retailers in more directions than ever before. The need to satisfy customers on all fronts, physical and digital, including those who chose click-and-collect for their purchases, was greater than years past. Many hailed...

Kohl’s – An Unlikely Source Of Tech Innovation
December 29, 2015

A la Biff of “Back to the Future” fame, the only sure-fire way to predict the future of retail is to skip ahead a few years and take a peek at a record of stock numbers. Failing that, proactive strategies that seek the initiative through cutting-edge...

Consumer Insights
Staples Doubles Down On SMB Price Match Policy
December 29, 2015

In the fight between in-store retailers and their digital counterparts for customers’ wallets, it’s more often than not the former that sets the pace with pricing and discounts. However, Staples is taking pains to make sure that it can compete — and then some —...

Consumer Finance
What Does The ‘Pink Tax’ Say About Retail’s Quest For Profit?
December 29, 2015

Shakespeare famously wrote that “a rose by any other name would smell as sweet,” but that poetic sentiment doesn’t quite translate when it comes to dissimilar prices on similar products. For the most part, customers don’t want to feel like superficial differences to a product,...

Beacon Adoption — Misguided Or Just Misunderstood?
December 24, 2015

Beacons are often touted as the next evolution of retail marketing for in-store merchants, but there’s been a conspicuous lack of observable progress among mainstream brands, as well as a troubling lack of supporting interest from shoppers. For an industry that’s become adjusted to fast-moving...

Consumer Insights
Millennials Are Making Companies Think Twice
December 24, 2015

Companies have had the better part of six decades to get to know their Baby Boomer employees and give them what they need to stay happy, healthy and, most importantly, as productive as possible. But how are those same businesses doing with millennials? Get the...

Consumer Insights
Hotels Are Renting Millennials An Experience, Not A Room
December 23, 2015

Hotels are in the business of giving consumers what they want. However, as one generation of consumers is replaced by another, it stands to reason that a new set of travel and lodging preferences comes to the forefront as well. Now that millennials are quickly...

Consumer Insights
Are UK Retail Sales A Canary In The Coal Mine?
December 22, 2015

Retailers have always had the months of November and December to rely on when sales ever looked less than ideal, but new reports from the U.K. suggest that even though sales might be up as Christmas draws nearer, there are disconcerting signs just over the...

Consumer Insights
On Super Saturday, How Low Did Retailers Go?
December 22, 2015

Who holds the power in the relationship between retailers and consumers? With fewer purchasing options, the answer might very well be the latter, but the combination of a panicked holiday shopping season and more online and offline deals that the average customer can research, some...