Securing the Future

Third, focus not on customer service but on the customer experience. “As an industry we already do an excellent job of customer service,” he said. “Now we need to concentrate on the entire shopping experience, from creative to the knowledge of contact center reps.”

Fourth, he said, “The Net is not a threat; it is our future.” The catalog industry needs to own the Web, he said. “It took the catalog industry 100 years to reach 5 percent of total retail sales. Meanwhile, it took e-commerce only five years to reach 4 percent. We should have a larger share of Web sales than we do,” he said. “We have all of the infrastructure in place. We must become the experts in Web marketing.”