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Do you remember when everyone used to go to the mall to go shopping, and hang out? It used to be the thing to do, but now the malls don't have nearly as many people in them, and people are charging less on their credit cards. Perhaps all this new frugality is a good thing, of course it's not helping our consumer driven economy as much as many of the retailers would have hoped for. So I ask you; when was the last time you went shopping?
Did you enjoy it, and are you looking forward to doing it again? If not, I'd like to make some suggestions to you that I recently learned about, things which can make your shopping experience much more exciting. I would like to turn you onto three new shopping methods that you'll just get a kick out of;
1. Re-arrange displays
2. Put anything you like into your cart
3. Text Message friends with Digital Pictures while shopping
Now then, I do remember in college I took a Retail Merchandising class, as it was an elective for getting a business degree. It was a very interesting class, and yet when I go shopping it appears to me that many people had never taken that class. Why do I say that you ask? It's simple, many of the displays have no taste whatsoever, and the retail merchandising strategy is dismal at best. If that wasn't enough, most of the time, the employees have no sense of taste, or they are following directives from the home office which actually makes the merchandise look less than adequate and un-attractive.
Perhaps you might help? Why not rearrange the displays slightly when you see obvious mistakes in fashion tastes in the display. Perhaps you are looking at some bedding, a comforter, and some pillows. But then somewhere else in the store you see a teddy bear. Why not take that teddy bear, and go put it on the bed for personality? You may think this is funny, and I'm sure you'll get a laugh out of it, but then you can take a digital picture on your smart phone and send it to friends; "do you think this looks pretty good?"
Another concept I learned of was to go shopping and just start putting everything in your cart that you'd like to have. And after the cart is totally filled, take out items that are the least desirable compared to the other items in the cart. Slowly dwindling the choices until it equals the amount of money you hope to spend, or leaves you with only those things that you can't live without. You may think this is cruel and unusual to the clerks of the retail store, because they have to put everything back. However, also realize that it was the retailer using all their branding and marketing tactics that enticed you to picking up the item in the first place - I guess it's their fault, not yours.
Further, you should realize that many of the store clerks aren't working that hard anymore, and they are busy text messaging friends. If they don't have time to put everything back, the store will actually have to hire more people, and therefore you are providing jobs, which is apropos considering how many employees the retail stores have cut, and how hard it is to find anyone in a retail store to help you or to give you assistance these days.
The final thing I learned, and this is happening more and more often, is that people while shopping are taking digital pictures of various items, and text messaging them to their friends, or even putting them on their Facebook page, for other people to come by and "like" them. In fact, there was an interesting article recently in the Wall Street Journal (May 9, 2012) titled "Can Texting Save Stores - Geocoferencing Let's Retailers Offer Deals to Nearby Customers, Fight Price Shopping," by Dana Mattioli and Miguel Bustillo.
Perhaps you can see how this final strategy is actually helping the retailer, because you are telling all of your friends the types of items they have in store, and letting your friends see them and "like" these types of products. In other words you are doing advertising for them. Besides that, you can have a lot of fun shopping if you try these new methods. Lastly, I would like to thank all those who contributed to the information in this article, you are the best and truly awesome as you know! Indeed I hope you will please consider all this and think on it.
Lance Winslow has launched a new provocative series of eBooks on Future Retailing Concepts. Lance Winslow is a retired Founder of a Nationwide Franchise Chain, and now runs the Online Think Tank; http://www.worldthinktank.net/
