PERSPECTIVES

Some thoughts from Nordstrom leadership that are spot on!

• “We started this company from scratch, so what would we want to be, knowing what we know now? It’s clear we can expect a new normal. And it's up to us to decide what that will look like. We're each being presented with the unique opportunity to create a future worth envisioning.”

That's what Nordstrom President and Chief Brand Officer Pete Nordstrom told Puget Sound Business Journal columnist Patti Payne on April 23, 2020.

And what he succinctly stated is exactly the challenge – and opportunity – that is confronting all retail owners. 

In order to answer whether you should re-open once you can, you first must be very confident in WHAT kind of retail operation you will be re-opening.

The only certainty of the aftermath of the pandemic is that everything will be different. Given that, what better time to re-imagine your business?

Let's assume your stores have been closed for weeks now. 

We recognize how conscientious you are. So, after paying what you can to your employees (and yourself), the next most-worrisome dilemma is your rent.

• How best to get some immediate relief from each month's lease payment?
• And you wonder, what would be the best way to negotiate with your landlord?

As you likely have discovered, a common choice for many landlords is to offer to defer your payments. But that means taking on more debt, as those payments are only being postponed to a later point in time. 

You need a better solution than that.

Retailing is so great. Every retailer is an optimist, a people-person, and a bold risk taker. (We know; been there, done that.) Every retailer wants to get their stores re-opened, and their staff people re-employed. 

Granted, there are many arguments, pro and con, about "Re-Opening the Economy." And in a number of communities in the U.S. and elsewhere, some re-opening of stores and restaurants is occurring. ​​

The Retail Owners Institute® has developed a retail strategy for "Inventory Management Going Forward." 

As we often do, it was recapped as an unassuming chart (see above) identifying the Five Stages of Merchandise Mix Management, from "Before COVID-19" to the "New Normal?"

Each of us, our households, businesses and communities are in different stages of shutdown due to the coronavirus.

While we cannot speak to when this will end, we do have some ideas for dealing with the "fog of uncertainty" that hangs over us all.

Remember thinking that Amazon was the most disruptive force to happen to retailing? (Well, at least since Walmart was the most disruptive....)

However, the coronavirus pandemic eclipses them all. No matter where you live or do business, it is not whether, just when, COVID-19 will impact your life. Disruption with a capital D!

There's little that any of us can do to address the public health crisis of the pandemic. Its impact on people and businesses is a widespread and major jolt, akin to the shocks of  9/11 and the 2008-09 economic meltdown. 

Even as painful and disruptive as the pandemic is at this moment, we must remind ourselves that it will subside. It's not whether it will subside, just when.

But all of us are going to have to deal with the ensuing economic situation, and its effects on our sales, our customers, our employees. 

These are difficult times for us all. Retailing in particular is under enormous stress. Many feel like there are no good choices. 

But, there are good decisions. And The ROI is dedicated to helping you be able to make those good decisions for yourself.