Management

The exterior view portrayed a strong, stable company — a well-oiled machine churning along toward future profits and continued success. The interior showed an entirely different story — a company crumbling just like one of its cookies. Mrs. Fields’ early success actually led to the downturn of its catalog direct/online unit. With that early success and rapid growth, Mrs. Fields didn’t invest properly in the infrastructure (marketing database, systems, tracking) of the direct division, says Greg Berglund, president of Salt Lake City-based Mrs. Fields Gifts. What’s more, the company failed to keep product offerings fresh and relevant, especially the refreshing of photography and item

In the IndustryEye section of this issue on pgs. 12-13, you’ll find our second quarterly Catalog Success Latest Trends Report, a benchmarking survey we conducted in late November in partnership with the multichannel ad agency Ovation Marketing. This one focuses on key catalog/multichannel issues, and we’ve included most of the charts there, so I encourage you to take a look. You’ll be able to find some charts only on our Web site due to magazine space limitations. We also didn’t have the space to include the numerous comments that you — our readers and survey respondents — wrote in response to two of the questions.

The 2nd Catalog Success Latest Trends Report on Key Issues (January 2008)

The 2nd Catalog Success Latest Trends Report on Key Issues (January 2008)

The 2nd Catalog Success Latest Trends Report on Key Issues (January 2008)

HOW DID YOU BREAK INTO THE CATALOG BUSINESS: With a thorough knowledge of computers. A former middle-school science teacher, Ann Killeen was introduced by a friend to Jerry Machado, who was then founding the Storybook Heirlooms catalog (now closed). In discussing working together, the two came to an understanding: “I said to Jerry, ‘I like computers,’ and he said, ‘OK, you’ll be the director of IT.’” Eight years later, after helping Storybook Heirlooms grow from a start-up company to a $30-million operation, Killeen had become fully immersed in the catalog business. She moved on to other catalogers, including Tzabaco, Boudin Bakery, Real Goods and

We bring you our exclusive new Catalog Success Latest Trends Report, the second quarterly joint venture with multichannel ad agency Ovation Marketing. This one focuses on the key issues in the catalog/multichannel business. As with our inaugural report last October, this survey contains a statistical analysis of a questionnaire we sent to the Catalog Success e-mail list in November. The responses came from 80 B-to-C and 45 B-to-B catalogers. You can click on the separate B-to-C and B-to-B charts below, as well as the cumulative chart. Some percentages don’t quite add up to 100, due to rounding.

Tax-savvy multichannel marketers know “nexus” isn’t a new hair product or a high-priced automobile. The term “nexus” (derived from a Latin word meaning “to connect”) refers to the amount of contact an out-of-state retailer must have with a state before that seller is legally obligated to collect sales tax from customers. The Supreme Court’s landmark Quill v. North Dakota decision in 1992 made clear that, under the Commerce Clause of the Constitution, the nexus standard requires an in-state physical presence on the part of the retailer. In other words, mail order sales alone will not subject a remote seller to sales or use-tax collection

I must admit I’ve frequently scrutinized those Lands’ End “ghettos” in Sears stores ever since Sears acquired the pride of Dodgeville, Wis., five and a half years ago. For a few years, Sears tried to sprinkle Lands’ End products amidst its mostly forgettable array of private label and largely undesirable polyester clothing. But I’m happy to report Sears is getting closer to getting the Lands’ End integration thing right. And when I received a 12-page mini-booklet — not quite a catalog, per se — I was truly blown away. The 63⁄4-inch x 51⁄8 inch outer cover wraps around eight 63⁄4 inch x 4 3⁄4

Did anybody else get an inferiority complex over the Thanksgiving weekend? I’m referring to the hoopla that surrounded Black Friday on Nov. 23. Like just about anything else in America, Black Friday gets bigger every year, and this year really went over the top. It got me thinking about the future: Does this “holiday” have to be a retail-only one? I certainly read enough about it. I saw plenty of TV news clips of those crazy, sleep-deprived shoppers lining up outside the stores in the wee hours of that Friday morning. I sifted through enough Circuit City, Kohl’s, Macy’s and Wal-Mart circulars about their