Nordstrom’s was founded by John W. Nordstrom in 1901. Nordstrom began as a shoe store and blossomed into a bigger establishment, which lead to expanding their brand to offer more than just shoes. Fast forward to today, and they have added speciality clothing brands, handbags, cosmetics, fragrances and even accessories. “Nordstrom is known first for its experience and second for its product offering” (Schmidt, 2015). Nordstrom headquarters are located in Seattle, Washington where the company first began their business. Nordstrom currently has 267 stores in 35 different states in the U. S which include Nordstrom Racks, boutiques and of course their full line department stores. Nordstrom has also satisfied the needs of the demand of the technological world by creating websites such as Nordstrom.com, Nordstromrack.com, Trunkclub.com and HauteLook.com. “Speed, …show more content…
Nordstrom is recognized as a company who values people and recognizes their performance. Nordstrom and its employees support many community organizations through special events and volunteering programs. While Nordstrom has a deep care for their community well-being, they also treat their employees with the same respect. While offering great service to every customer, they make sure every employee is courteous to the consumer and even their own co-workers. For 20 consecutive years now, Nordstrom has made Fortune’s 100 best companies to work for. “At a 2014 Great Place to Work conference, Blake Nordstrom, co-president and director, focused his presentation on the retailer’s “culture empowerment,”where “each individual at the company feels like its their name on the door” (Zacklewicz, 20). In 5 years, Nordstrom has gained 110% of their companies shares. “The company is well-positioned to continue that success in the future, according to a recent report by Deutsche Bank” (Lutz,
Nordstrom and Nordstrom Rack are different retail operations in terms of their choice, pricing, store service, and store atmosphere customer intimate firms, which excel in serving the specific needs of the individual customer well. There is less emphasis on efficiency, which is sacrificed for giving more precisely what is wanted by the customer. Reliability is also stressed. Nordstrom is an example of this discipline. Nordstrom must meet some standards of cost-effectiveness. When customers evaluate the quality of a product, they commonly measure it against two kinds of attributes: those related to quality as excellence and those related to the quality of reliability. From a quality as excellence perspective, the important qualities are things such as a product’s design and styling, its aesthetic appeal, its features and functions, the level of service associated with the delivery of the product,
Lowe’s tries to foster collaboration and strength in a variety of methods; many are through leadership training tracks and supporting employees and their families. During times economic uncertainty, it is important that individuals know that they an organization that cares and supports them. In a comprehensive report released by Lowes, the company detailed improvements Lowe’s achieved in important focus areas, including the health, safety and engagement of employees, the company’s advancement towards its 2020 goals and its partnership with suppliers to maintain the highest ethical standards and improve the products it sells (Lowe’s Companies, 2015a). According to Lowe’s Companies (2015a), “For the first time in Lowe’s annual Employee Opinion Survey, all of its U.S. stores, distribution centers and customer support centers all reached the company’s benchmark engagement goal of 65 percent, indicating a highly engaged and satisfied staff” (para 4).. “Career Bliss recognized Lowe’s as one of the 10 happiest retailers to work for in 2014” (Lowe’s Companies, 2015, para 5). To keep an organization running efficiently and effectively, you need a good customer base; you cannot achieve this without helpful, courteous and willing employees. Lowe’s understand that to keep up in the industry, they need to ensure they employees are taken care of
Brookshire’s Grocery Company is a privately held Texas based retail food chain that operates in Texas, Louisiana, and Arkansas. The company’s corporate office and headquarters are located in Tyler, Texas at the Tyler distribution center. Brookshire’s operates under three distinct banners: Brookshire’s food stores which are full service supermarkets, Super 1 Foods stores which are upscale warehouse style stores, and FRESH by Brookshire’s which is a concept store. Brookshire’s Grocery is rated #193 on the Forbes America’s Largest Private Company List with revenues of 2.4 billion as of December of 2013 (Forbes, 2013).
Nordstrom retail stores have large hallways, and everything is presented in a very classy manner. The color scheme includes pale yellows, whites, and gold, to provide a more elegant appearance in the store in order to make the shopped feel special. The design is also seen through product organization. Compared to stores like Macy’s, which organize their products based on brand, Nordstrom organizes their products based on lifestyle. Because of this, it is easier for shoppers to find clothes similar to their style as opposed to by brand. In effect, shoppers will purchase more products. This also is a type of experiential retailing, where Nordstrom customers are able to experience the elements of their lifestyle within one section. More so, the product presentation will draw people’s eyes to products, even if they are not looking for it. This gives Nordstrom a competitive advantage in relation to other similar retail stores because it makes their store look more glamorous and high-end. While other stores may focus on value, Nordstrom utilizes the retail positioning strategy to make a customer feel more high-end and
Nordstrom is one of the top retailers in the United States. With a solid brand image and a sound financial situation, Nordstrom is relentless in their expansion in the US, and are beginning to expand into international markets. Nordstrom takes pleasure in providing state of the art client support and having experienced sales people. In order to hold their position as the most successful high-end retailer in the United States, Nordstrom must continue to figure out ways to improve their brand image and customer satisfaction. Nordstrom’s current business working strategy is successful but I believe there are a few ideal solutions that the organization could apply to further enhance the organization. Due to the aggressive characteristics of the fashion retail store market, it is crucial that Nordstrom preserves an aggressive advantage providing the highest level of customer support as possible.
J. Crew, also known as J. Crew Group Inc., is a private label company known for its preppy fashions that are fashionable yet costly. Essentially, the company was owned by the Cinader family for most of its history. Mitchell Cinader and Saul Charles founded the company in 1947. It was originally known as Popular Merchandise Inc. doing business as the Popular Club Plan, in which Mitchell’s son Arthur was the overseer. The company sold women’s clothing through in-home demonstrations. In the early 1980’s, Cinader and Charles observed catalog retailers such as Land’s End, Talbots and L.L. Bean reporting rising sales in revenue. With intentions to increase sales and duplicate success of these well known companies, Popular Club Plan began its own catalog (http://www.fundinguniverse.com/company-histories/j-crew-group-inc-history/).
I chose to research two very different apparel retail stores. The GAP, Inc. and Nordstrom, Inc. are very interesting companies to me because they deal with something that is very important to me and a lot of people, clothes. Everyone buys and wears clothes, and these are two companies who have succeeded in this venture. They both started out with the same intentions, to sell apparel through specialty stores, but at this point Nordstrom’s has been more successful.
Being an upscale industry, Abercrombie and Fitch would appear to be a successful corporation. Although the company was once successful for a number of years, it’s apparent that there has been a significant decline in its overall appeal and how much revenue the company acquires each year. With just over 1,000 retail stores in the U.S., Canada, and Europe, Abercrombie and Fitch has thrived to be one of the most avid corporate extensions.
In fact, it is the culture of motivated and empowered entrepreneurial employees that makes Nordstrom’s culture unique (Spector & McCarthy, 2012). There are less rules and procedures for Nordstrom’s sales personnel than in other retail organizations. Their sales clerks also operate with a certain level of autonomy, running their departments almost as if they are private stores (Mello, 2015). This overall strategic approach to HR keeps training costs low, and consequently the cost of turnover is also minimized. This is important, as Nordstrom’s turnover, due to the level of internal competition and entrepreneurialism this type of retail strategy requires, is one of the highest in its market (Mello, 2015). The high turnover rate makes HR planning an important factor in ensuring a stable workforce that can create and maintain ongoing customer relationships (Spector & McCarthy, 2012).
My company of choice for this report is Macy 's. 'The Magic of Macy 's ', as the company advertises it, has inspired me to shop there, take advantage of their incomparable discounts and great online shopping experience. Macy 's, Inc. is one of the largest department store chains in the United States of America. Macy 's manages stores under the Macy 's and Bloomingdale 's brands. I enjoy shopping at both of the company 's store brands, Macy 's and Bloomingdales. Bloomingdales provides a more personalized experience
Nordstrom’s product offerings are not only of the best quality available, but are also presented in a fashion appealing to customers. The reputation Nordstrom has built in the industry has sustained their success for over a century. Nordstrom’s further expects to enhance their company philosophy in the future by implementing additional differentiation tactics that will continue their market dominance in highly volatile economy.
Consumer purchasing decisions and behavior is continuing to change, not just in the U.S. but worldwide, shifting more away from the department store and onto the web. In such a changing environment, customer relationship management (CRM) becomes more important than ever, especially to a company such as Nordstrom who is the gold standard of customer service, the measuring stick by which other companies measure themselves (Spector & McCarthy, n.d.). The key for Nordstrom will be to adapt their traditional core strength, intimate and personalized customer service, to this new environment.
For the final group project we chose to complete a management analysis on Wal-Mart. Covered in this paper are the issues of productivity, hiring practices, corporate social responsibility and culture, diversity and affirmative action, the use of information technology, leadership, teamwork, and managing ethics.
The most significant component of Wal-Mart’s success was the way it treated its employees or as they are known as in Wal-Mart “associates”, the beliefs or rules of the Wal-Mart culture makes associates want to provide excellent service to its customers. During visits Walton encouraged associates to pledge to greet customers and ask if they assist them or walking into a Wal-Mart store customers are met by a greeter, an associate who welcomed them and handed out shopping carts (Farhoomand, 2006).