Case Study: Customer Response to a Dying Category
The case study shows that cutting the assortment of the Apparel Tops fashion category caused a sharp decline in both rebuy rates and the number of new or reactivated buyers. Rebuy rates fell from a high of 3.0% to 1.5%, while the pool of new/reactivated shoppers dropped from 54,438 to 27,308, a near‑50% reduction. The analysis highlights that roughly 80% of demand in such categories comes from these acquisition‑focused buyers, requiring heavy marketing investment in awareness and search. The author warns that while expanding assortment can boost sales, it also introduces inventory and margin challenges.
Case Study: Killing a Category
The case study compares two retail categories—Apparel Tops and Fashion—highlighting divergent performance trends. Apparel Tops showed relatively stable sales, with new style introductions ranging from 799 to 637 and consistent year‑two demand. In contrast, the Fashion category experienced a sharp...
Case Study: What A Difference
Beans, the online variety store, reported a sharp decline in sales for new merchandise, with a two‑year comp of -34.6% and a November‑December dip of -49.4%. Existing merchandise performed far better, slipping only -1.2% over the same period. The downturn...
Teams
The article reframes business performance around the concept of interconnected "Teams"—human groups, product categories, and marketing channels—that collectively drive customer outcomes. It argues that traditional metrics like digital advertising ROAS fail to capture the value added by these teams, especially...
Brawndo
The post uses the 2006 film "Idiocracy"—specifically the Brawndo scene—to illustrate how corporate leaders can become so entrenched in a single narrative that they ignore critical data. It recounts a cabinet member insisting plants need Brawndo and another dismissing factual...
American Top 40
The post revives the classic American Top 40 radio format as a template for modern email marketing. It proposes a weekly “Top 40” list of best‑selling products, ranked by combined sales, units, and conversion metrics, and suggests distributing the list across email,...
I Asked The Question Because ...
A recent analysis shows that mailing catalogs to reactivation candidates is financially unsustainable. With a demand price of $1.30 per book and an advertising cost of $0.90, the profit calculation yields a $0.38 loss per mailed item, translating to a...
A Shift in Leadership
The author reflects on a fifteen‑year evolution from abundant, often chaotic leadership in early retail to a modern landscape dominated by charismatic thought leaders. He argues that figures like Seth Godin have reshaped marketing rhetoric, favoring flashy, low‑effort advice over genuine...