About 15 years ago someone asked me three questions about retail operations: 

1. What is the most important thing about retail?

2. If I were to develop a retail program, what should I include in it?

3. What would be the #1 item in terms of retail?

I responded with a bit of a metaphor: When you ask a realtor what’s important about a building or a home, the answer has always been three things: location, location, location.

Having had my own retail stores, managing others and expanding one to multiple states, then becoming part of the executive team of one of the largest retailers in the world, I learned that retail also has three key components.

They are: merchandising, merchandising, merchandising.

It’s all about the merchandise.

1. What is the merchandise?

2. Where is the merchandise from?

3. Who is the merchandise for?

4. What story does the merchandise tell you?

5. What are you telling me about your merchandise by the way it is presented?

6. What will I gain by buying your merchandise?

It is all about merchandising no matter how you look at it.

We continue to see more retail stores and space opening up. While I encourage you to think about location, from my perspective, location is not as relevant as the merchandise you will put in the store.

Are you solving a problem or filling a need for the community? I must also mention that being a destination store is important… but that is a topic for another day.

BEFORE YOU GO

We see our blogs as opportunities for dialogue. Please share your thoughts as comments.

1. What story does your merchandise tell?

2. Who is the likely buyer?

3. Why should customers come to you for their merchandise?