The Thread
Editor-in-Chief Jennifer Marks shares news and views from around the home textiles marketplace.
Heads up, table linen types…
The New York Tabletop Show wrapped up Friday. Here's the 411 on the week from Traditional Home senior style editor Krissa Rossbund, who shared her thoughts during a presentation yesterday morning at tabletop showroom building 41 Madison:• Turquoise seen in porcelain and glassware. "We even saw blue flatware."• Purple endures. "It's not everybody's favorite color, but when they see i... Read More
Comments (2)Going Back to Basics
Some 15 years or so ago, McDonald's was doing some soul-searching and trying to class itself up, as it does from time to time. (This was well before McCafe came along.)An opinion piece in a trade newspaper covering the food industry offered the following advice: McDonald's key driver is cheap kiddie meals stocked with cheap toys, and McDonald's should focus on being the best provider of cheap kidd... Read More
Comments (1)JCP: The One to Watch
JCPenney delivered another not-so-hot monthly comp sales performance last week, one sufficiently discouraging that it announced it is now projecting a loss for the third quarter. But last week the retailer also announced another hiring coup: Target marketing ace Micahael Francis will join the company as president. This follows the July news that former Apple retail vp Ron Johnson will officially t... Read More
Comments (1)A Bit of ConText
HTT brushed off the moniker for its ConText conference series during market and held a mini-seminar on all things digital. It was probably the most enlightening three hours I've spent in some time.The following were my take-away notes from a program that did a great job of de-mystifying the rapidly burgeoning world of social media marketing:1. It's not necessary to plunge in to every kind of socia... Read More
Comments (1)Ready. Set. Market
Notebooks at the ready! It's time to plunge into the fall New York Home Fashions Market.Based on what we've heard about and eyeballed so far, here's what to expect:Technology: In utility bedding and sheeting especially, the early signs points to an emphasis on technological innovation. Look for proprietary fibers, finishes and applications. I'm not seeing much in this vein so far on the bath towel... Read More
Comments (6)Home is Where the Cart is
For all the concern about consumer spending intentions - well-placed, certainly - one channel of retailing continues to balloon: e-commerce.Retailers that serve hard-pressed moderate consumers in particular have noted that their shoppers are cutting back on the number of trips they're making to stores. At the same time, online shopping grows steadily.In the recent spate of quarterly financial repo... Read More
Comments (5)Luxe Life
The good news for home textiles exhibitors heading into the New York International Gift Fair/New York Home Textiles Week at mid-month is that luxury shoppers are buying robustly.Despite the miniscule gains to the overall economy, Master Card Advisors Spending Pulse reported 10 consecutive months of growth for the broad luxury sector. The New York Times heralded the phenomenon last week with the he... Read More
Comments (0)Lost in Translation
Carrefour is having a spot of trouble in China. The government has fined the hypermarket for claiming that the original prices on discounted merchandise were actually higher than they turned out to have been. Eleven of its 180 units have been fined $76,000 each. I guess the Chinese just don't appreciate the good old-fashioned, Western style of flim-flammery we call marketing.A manufacturing execut... Read More
Comments (2)Climbing Out
Numbers from the Top 50 Retailing Giants may not be super-duper, but they certainly mark 2010 as a year of recovery for many retailers.Consider that in last year's report, 58% of the retailers on HTT's list logged sales declines - seven of them double-digit drops. This year, there is not a single double-digit decliner, and 66% of the retailers in the ranking reported sales gains.Only one was absol... Read More
Comments (6)Sobering Stats
Lord, it don't come easy. The June jobs report released late last week showed a gain of just 18,000 jobs - drastically lower than economists had expected and even worse than the original May report's 54,000 job increase. About an hour before the report was released, I was reading a piece about job growth on The Atlantic Monthly's website that offered some sobering statistics:"According to Bur... Read More
Comments (2)Retail Politics
In this wholly wired world, there's a new maxim: Consumers want to do business with companies that do good - whether that goodness involves the environment, the less fortunate, local communities, conditions in overseas factories or all of the above.So Target Stores Inc., which has been involved in local and large-scale giving for some 65 years and whose philanthropic slogan is "Here For Good... Read More
Comments (1)A Closer Look at The Pie
As Washington pols wrestle over who should or should not be taxed and how much of the pie should be redistributed to which economic tier, Ad Age has released a study that should give everyone in the mass market retail world pause. The top 10% of U.S. households are responsible for nearly half of the country's purchasing power, leading Ad Age to conclude: "...it's time to abandon the idea of m... Read More
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