The Internet Of Things. A Reality Check For Retail

The IoT is not new. In fact, I first heard the term bandied about at the RFID Center at the Auto-ID labs at MIT, when I first became an analyst in 2002-2003. Back then, it was all about RFID. Now it’s about a little bit of everything when it comes to location-awareness, with everything from refrigerators to our mobile devices sending out “Hello World” beacons to anything or anyone who might want to pair with them.

The World Of Retail Financing. Lending, Private Equity, Leasebacks And Turnarounds

The tagline for the CFA is pretty clear: It’s “The Association For Professionals In The Asset-based Lending And Factoring Industry.”Now, this may sound dry as toast to some of you, but indulge me a few minutes here…because truth be told, without the companies that are part of this group, the retail industry would quite literally come to a screeching halt. And for those of you who self-identify as “laggards” – sales running below the rate of inflation, members of this group, who specialize in financing and turnaround planning for depressed companies, may make the difference between survival and your company’s end of days. That’s how important a lender or restructurer who understands retail can be.

Profitable Fulfillment Are We There Yet?

Back in January, the folks at Aptos asked us to help them figure out the success retailers are having with cross-channel fulfillment. We all know that many retailers are willing to let customers “have it our way” when it comes to satisfying demand. We also had a feeling that it might be working, but it likely wasn’t working all that well.

Retail Still Moves More Slowly Than Needed

A fascinating walk down memory lane. Granted, we “only” are talking about newsletter articles written over the past five years: since 2011, but five years is a long time in consumer IT years.

Here are some “flashbacks” that really could be published as new articles today.

Are Retailers Finally Getting Serious About Servicing Plus Size Women?

Long-time readers will remember that I’ve bemoaned the state of the plus-sized clothing industry for many years. And those of you who’ve met me will know why. I’m a customer. And I’m not alone. Current estimates of the percentage of the female population larger than size 12 are up to 60%.

That’s a lot of money being left on the table.

Luxury Fashion Disrupted

The world is changing quickly, and no one, not even high end fashion brands, is immune to those changes. The new era, what I’ve started to call the “second phase of disruption” is tied to two things: the ascendancy of Millennials into their highest spending years, and fast fashion retailers’ ability to bring products to market four times faster than their competitors.