Management

Historians eventually will look on last year as the beginning of the end for retail stores (aka fixed asset distribution) as we know them. Holiday ’08 retail sales dipped 5.5 percent to 8 percent from the previous year, the most dramatic decline in decades. Few, if any, retailers projected such drama.

Next month, the Direct Marketing Educational Foundation will honor four winners of its 2009 Rising Stars Awards, as well as credit card payment management platform provider Litle & Co. as its Corporate Commitment award winner.

This month we spoke with John Doheny, CEO of Doheny’s Water Warehouse, the catalog/multichannel pool supplies business his parents started 42 years ago.

In tough times like these, companies often look for Band-Aids to slap over problems so they can get by. This year we all have problems, and the catalog business isn’t immune to them. In many respects, namely the losing battle they continue to fight with the USPS (although at press time, there was a glimmer of hope for postage to be adjusted downward for larger-volume mailers), catalogers are hurting worse than others.

Lane Bryant: The women’s plus-size specialty apparel retailer has launched a new fashion retail catalog. The catalog was mailed to 3 million existing customers beginning in March. Lane Bryant, which isn’t connected with the former Lane Bryant catalog that Redcats USA (and before that, Brylane) used to operate, also unveiled a new toll-free number to handle orders and customer service inquiries, joining its retail stores and e-commerce site. The new catalog conveys a fashion-inspired look with a new attitude and bright colors.

This month, Terry Powers, founder/president of the ComputerGear catalog, recalls how a simple dare led to her career in the catalog business.

Like most, I’ve seen my family wealth shrink. I’ve seen friends and colleagues get laid off. I’ve seen the stock market continue to be eaten up by the bears. I’m seeing the catalog/multichannel business, as we know it, dwindle, while the overall retail business is in tatters. I’ve seen the size of our magazine diminish as the vendor community is hurting big-time. And I’ve seen some of our competitors all but disappear.

Selecting software for order management or warehouse management systems, e-commerce solutions, or other applications is a challenging task. The process begins by documenting a set of requirements, constructing a request for proposal (RFP), identifying vendors, viewing Web demos, and conducting site visits and reference checks. But a trend is emerging to select vendors based on word-of-mouth recommendations and two-hour Web demos. The question is, is that really the right approach?

This month we profile Jason Blake, the 31-year-old founder/president of the The Pond Guy, a catalog/multichannel retailer of pond, lake and water garden supplies.

"Are consumers afraid to spend, or just broke?” So asked the heading of a recent New York Times letter to the editor. If your business is still struggling to overcome the disaster that was last year — one of the worst economic meltdowns in living memory — you need to focus even more on restructuring, cutting costs and, yes, laying people off if you want to recover and survive.