Merchandising

How to use a warehouse assessment to improve customer service and decrease costs. Your warehouse this past holiday season was near capacity; you made it through the season, but it wasn’t pretty. The marketing plans for the new year and next holiday are up considerably. The executive committee of your multichannel company has made a decision that the company must meet the aggressive sales plan, and you have to find ways to stay in this facility for at least one more year. You have two months to come up with a new operational plan. What are you going to do? A key starting point

A cataloger’s job of presenting merchandise is second in importance only to selecting the right merchandise. Readers decide in seconds whether they’re going to continue to read about a product or move on. The amount of information readers comprehend “at a glance” isn’t limited by their brains; it’s only limited by what we put in front of them. Even those interested in a product will skip over it if they don’t understand it or they’re not “sold” on it. What and how you show product in your catalog makes all the difference in the world. The following list contains the most frequent

Onsite merchandising is the top initiative planned by 75 percent of e-commerce executives to improve site performance, according to the Annual Merchant Survey conducted by e-commerce consultancy The e-tailing group. Among other data revealed by the survey of 190 senior e-commerce executives: * 70 percent of e-commerce executives plan to add or improve onsite search to improve Web sales; down from 77 percent last year. * 64 percent plan to redesign or upgrade their sites; level with last year’s survey. * 60 percent plan to devote resources to content development; up from 53 percent last year. * 50 percent plan to overhaul the online

Regardless of organizational structure or size, catalogers who manufacture their own products are made up of multiple groups that must cooperate if the business is to be successful. Productivity is at stake when the two main players, those in management and production, are not working as one unit. Following are a few ways management and production teams can start working together to gain a competitive edge: * Obliterate false divisions. A recent client often used language that emphasized whether a particular employee was “union” or “company.” I worked diligently to get everyone using the same vocabulary: Everyone is now “WE.” Not only did they unlock the

While a great merchandiser has developed predictive instincts to guide her through planning her next great catalog, a smart merchandiser will supplement those instincts with a well-thought-out strategy, writes Katie Muldoon, author of “The Catalog Strategist’s Toolkit” (Racom Communications). Muldoon identifies some elements critical to any merchandiser’s strategy: * Have a game plan. “This means a written strategy based on known sales for the year before,” Muldoon writes. In combination with your circulation plan, this game plan will help you decide which product categories and price ranges should be increased, decreased or re-tested. * Get the right analysis. Many catalogers still don’t conduct enough

Reiman Publications uses both catalogs and magazines to expertly serve its loyal base of rural consumers. When the editors of Farm Wife News started producing T-shirts with slogans such as, “I’m proud to be a Farm Wife,” for their readers back in the early 1970s, they didn’t know that offshoot merchandise would launch a catalog business. A few years later, Country Store catalog was born, filling a niche in the rural marketplace. Ann Kaiser, managing editor of Taste of Home and editor of Country Woman magazine, was with the company 34 years ago when the catalog concept first was developed at Reiman Publications. She

Testing front covers is one of the easiest and most important tests catalogers can do. Front covers are the doorway into your catalog, so your cover must entice customers to open the door and step through into the wonderful world inside. Testing will help you learn what it takes to get your customers to open that door more often. “Copy destroys the graphic integrity of my cover design.” Magazine designers love a lot of copy on the front cover, but catalog designers hate it. “I’ve been designing catalogs for years. Trust me, I know what sells,” said Maurice, the catalog designer. “All those words

With Americans spending as much as $26 billion on holiday gifts online in the past two months, an increase of 18 percent from 2004, according to Jupiter Research, chances are good you’ve just shipped a record number of packages. As you begin to assess how well you weathered the holiday rush, consider how your customers received your products. Did all your packages arrive in one piece? How many returns were due to damaged merchandise? Following are new products and services that can help keep your packages safe and your fulfillment center in top form. Foam Packaging Delivered at Room Temperature Instapak

When determining an inventory forecast, get everyone operating on the same assumptions, said Gina Valentino, vice president and general manager of catalog consultancy J. Schmid and Associates. For example, to ensure your operational systems agree, determine which days begin and end the week for each department. “Your call center may work on a Sunday through Saturday schedule for staff scheduling purposes, while your distribution center may work on a Monday through Sunday schedule,” said Valentino during the session “Forecasting the Future: Tips and Tricks from Marketing and Merchandising,” held during The Direct Marketing Association’s Annual Conference in New Orleans in October. “You want everyone working

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