Digg Features Article about Retail

I just found this interesting article on Digg.com called "What Retailers Don't Tell Consumers", it is hosted at Yahoo.

What was better is the article about a Wal-Mart employee who smashed a self-checkout monitor, and a woman who threw a bible at a Piggly Wiggly employee who was trying to register customers for biometric checkout. Reminds me of the Archaic Smile t-shirts featuring Jesus with a UPC symbol on his forehead. Just not sure what to think about that one.

Anyway, here's the link to the eWeek article:

"Hell Hath No Fury Like a Consumer Ticked Off"

CVS Photo Processing

My fiance loves photos, picture frames, and taking pictures, and I love a bargain so when we got a coupon for 10 free prints at CVS, it was a fun excursion for us both.

We went to the store with my trusty Sandisk 2GB USB flash drive loaded up with digital pictures, plugged it into the Kodak photo kiosk, punched up a few buttons, then went about our shopping. After we purchased our regular items, the photos were ready.

This is a great experience. The photos would only have been $0.29 if we didn't have a coupon, and talk about instant gratification! No shipping fees either. This is going to be a big boon for Kodak and photo-mart retailers as more consumers embrace digital photography.

It would be nice if they had high-quality printers for printing PDF documents as well. Adobe should partner with Kodak, Epson, Xerox or someone to install high-quality, self-service PDF printers. That would be awesome!

Bed Bath and Beyond

Bed Bath and Beyond is a well run store. They sell quality products for good prices, run great promotions, and offer coupons out the wazoo.

My fiance and I recently registered there, and while we were there, I picked up a couple of new travel coffee mugs. Wouldn't you know it, one of the coffee mugs had a leak. I brought it back into the store, and they exchanged it without a blink of an eye.

I didn't expect this type of service from a low-cost retailer. Very impressive!

Dunkin Donuts versus Starbucks

I recently had the opportunity to hear Mike Sheehan from Hill Holiday, Connors, and Cosmopolous speak. Like any good agency CEO, he spoke about his clients, namely Dunkin Donuts.

Dunkin Donuts is dear to my heart. When I was young, my friends and I could hang out there, skateboard, talk with the staff, and buy donuts. Nowadays, I live right down the street from the original Dunkin Donuts (not to mention International House of Pancackes - which is now a parking lot!).

Needless to say, Dunkins is changing their brand. This is uncomfortable for me at first, but I'm starting to come around. They are becoming more about coffee than about donuts. Why? Money. You make a lot more dough off of coffee.

Look at Starbucks, they've managed to take over the world only serving coffee. They are really selling an experience, but the tangible product is a coffee. They've also managed to keep their stores busy throughout the day, a seemingly difficult challenge for Dunkins.

Dunkins is up for the Starbucks challenge, fresh with mucho diniero and a bunch of private equity managers. Of note, Thomas H. Lee, who brokered the Pepsi / Snapple deal, and made a bundle in the process. Can you say non-alcoholic beverage king? Go Tommy!

Dunkins has scrapped their plan of using Togo's and Baskins to acheive the day part sales they are looking for, and are now using smoothies to extend their sales throughout the day. This might just work. Why don't they just buy Island Oasis, Planet Smoothie, and Jamba Juice?

I need to write Mike a letter about in-store marketing.

External Links:
Hill Holiday's Dunkin Donuts Blog Page

Video Displays

For those of you that may have seen the movie Minority Report, you'll be familiar with the idea of personalized billboards. While that is still science fiction, we'll be seeing "moving" advertisements in stores very soon.

We already see them to some degree today, but the ones we'll see soon enough will be a whole lot smarter and slicker. These ones will have content that is almost specific to the customers who are shopping each store and throughout each day.

For example, a coffee shop might sell a lot of cappucino in one neighborhood, and a lot of regular joe in another. Then at lunch, they may sell a lot of smoothings at the first locations, and a lot of bagels at the second. With dynamic displays, retail stores will be able to "narrowcast" pertinent ads to specific locations, at specific times.

Freaky, huh?