Macy's and Dillard's

Macy operates in department store retail industry. The U.S. Department Store industry includes over 3500 stores with combined annual revenue of $70 billion representing 20% of the global industry. Department stores in the US increased at a compounded annual growth rate (CAGR) of 3.4% between 2004 and 2009. The US Department store product mix includes a variety of products such as women, men, and children apparel, shoes, cosmetics, and home and furniture. Clothing and footwear market sales accounted for a 53% share of the department stores retail format in 2009 (DataMonitor).

WalMart's (NYSE:WMT) expertise in discount retailing is globally recognized, as is their supply chain and extensive logistics capabilities. What differentiates WalMart from the many other discount retailers is their extensive reliance on buyer personas or representations of their customers. All aspects of the WalMart value chain are predicated on serving their customers as cost-effectively and efficiently as possible. WalMart has also created an extensive information systems network that includes satellite uploads of data on a daily basis from their thousands of retail locations to their Bentonville, Arkansas headquarters (WalMart Investor Relations, 2013). The intent of this analysis is to evaluate the mission, vision and strategy of WalMart from the perspective of improving its customer service while also taking into account its financial position. To accomplish this, objectives are provided, combined with performance measures and expected levels of performance as well. All of these factors taken together provide senior management at WalMart with insights into how they can profitably improve customer service.

Due to the economy downturn period, Macy’s and many other retailers were suffering. Fortunately, Macy’s has chosen the beneficial marketing strategy to fit the objective of business. This paper will analyze the company’s situation from its financial aspect, industry aspect, the competitive part and Macy’s marketing strategies to conclude that Macy’s could have stable profit in the next three to five years.

There are many retail giants that have had an active presence on the market for sometime. A few that come to mind are JCPenny, Macy’s and Nordstorm’s. However, one major retail chain that has spread across the country was started right here in the state of Arkansas. Dillard’s first department store was opened in 1938 in Nashville, Arkansas by its founder William Dillard. Since its inauguration, Dillard’s has turned into one of the more prominent retailers in the United States. With an ever growing market base and clientele, Dillard’s has seen successful since the early 1950s. This success, however, leaves people with a few questions about the Arkansas native retail giant. What does Dillard’s current market look like? How does Dillard’s compare

Being tasked with creating an evaluation of Dillard’s strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats allowed for the development of a proposal that could help Dillard’s as a company. Unbeknownst to our group this information would be helpful in developing a proposal and portions would lead directly to our proposal. It will be discussed in the proposal analysis how our proposal is associated with the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats of Dillard’s and shed some light on how these areas of research led to the proposal of Dillard’s implementing beauty salons in their existing stores across the United States.

The industry we have chosen is the department store-retail industry. Within this industry, we have chosen the department stores of JCPenney and Macy’s. We find this industry, as well as these two companies, interesting from a strategic perspective. JCPenney has recently undergone a massive strategic restructuring in regards to its pricing, brand offerings, and store layout, pushing it away from the typical department store strategy of discounts and coupons. Its new strategy has become much closer to Wal-Mart’s strategy of every day low prices. Macy’s, on the other hand, has restructured with a push from the economic

Nordstrom’s main focus is all about customer satisfaction. When customer satisfaction is high so are the

Department stores are not easy to manage, and take a whole team of individuals to run daily operations smoothly. Dillard’s success at the turn of the century came from balancing finances properly, incorporating a friendly atmosphere, and building its reputation as a welcoming upscale department store. In recent years, however, Dillard’s Inc. has surfaced in headlines for being listed as one of the worst companies in the nation to work for. With stiff competition and acquisition factors, the department store industry is not one to lag behind in and

Kohl’s Corporation and Dillard’s Inc. are in the retail industry which is a highly competitive industry. There are a high number of retail stores, department stores which compete between each other on local, regional and national level. That competitiveness is highly influencing operating results of the company.

Comparative shopping is done in the industry constantly. But the point of the task is to identify strengths and weaknesses of your store’s merchandise mix in comparison to the competitors’. Are you offering the customer something unique in one segment of your business, but not in others? Are you just a poor second in comparison to a strong competitor? Are you under- or over-developed in certain classifications? Are your prices in line with the rest of your store? In relation to your

Many people know that Nordstrom 's is a fashion bazaar. What multitudinous amounts of people do not grasp is that Nordstrom 's positioned itself as a retailer of high end clothing and extravagant goods. This is how Nordstrom 's distinguished itself from other retailers. Numerous people associate Nordstrom’s with other ubiquitous department stores, such as Macy 's and JC Penney. Interestingly, these stores are not Nordstroms ' predominant competitors. Because Nordstrom 's caters to a more expensive partiality, its main competitors include upscale department stores such as Bloomingdale 's and Saks Fifth Avenue. Within Nordstrom’s marketing strategy, the emporium must strategize ways to discern itself from both the mid-scale department stores as well as the high-end ones. Nordstrom’s is able to accomplish this through its determination of which products to vend, its customer service policies, and the schematics of typical Nordstrom 's store design.

Retailers offer different merchandise assortments to the customers, and one of the key functions of the retailer is selecting the appropriate depth and breadth of various branded products and their assortments, and to decide how best to tailor the product offerings for specific target consumers (Joachim Zentes, Dirk Morschett, Hanna Schramm-Klein, 2007). One drawback, which we have identified, is the lack of customization options available for customers on all three of the websites, i.e. Target, Macy’s and Nordstrom. It is important for online retailers to offer customization offers to the customers, so that they can tailor make their products as their very own. While it is true, that this option is mostly used for niche markets, however, in

Macy’s Inc. has a very strong network all over in the United States under its two main brand names but the company has very weak geographic presence. All of its business functions are in the United States. Any changes in the economic, political, legal, and social framework of the country will have direct impact on the business operations of Macy’s Inc. and its profitability will suffer many folds.

The financial data will support the strategy as the ratios and numbers show that Macy’s has resources and capital available for the implementation. Evaluation of external and internal factors positively presenting an opportunity for Macy’s to use designed strategy to and keep competitiveness in the industry. Summarizing Macy’s is a well-established organization with over 150 successful years in business that still has an ability to compete with leaders in the industry if the right

According a Gartner study, “89% of marketing leaders expect to compete primarily on the basis of customer experience.”