VMSD - December 2013 - (Page 34)
TOP 10
Penney for your thoughts?
By Steve Kaufman, Editor-at-Large
34 DECEMBER 2013 | vmsd.com
vate retailer had to endure 12 months of continual
very public embarrassment.
Was it the only retail story of the year? No. But it
was certainly the biggest.
1
A P EN N EY SAV E D
In April, shortly after
announcing "big mistakes
had been made," Ron
Johnson resigned as ceo
of JCPenney. What had
begun 17 months earlier
with a flurry of promising initiatives - new logo,
new ad campaign, new pricing policy, new Sunday
circulars - came crashing down in an avalanche of
management changes, public ridicule, alienated customers and plunging sales, revenues and stock price
for the 111-year-old company that had always valued
privacy and dignity above all.
Shareholder and board member William Ackman
cried the loudest for a change in management, even
Don H ey l , CI nCI n nAT I
JCPenney Co. Inc. (Plano, Texas) spent much of
2013 trying to reverse every initiative introduced over
the last two years by its former ceo Ron Johnson.
It consolidated its three tiers of pricing back into
one: "fake sale prices." It took down pictures of the
Apple logo from the company's executive suite. It
cancelled orders for "special sale" $4000 Manolo
Blahnik alligator pumps for its shoe departments.
It tried to regain the "core customers" it had lost by
hosting a series of luncheons at the local Denny's.
It restored most of its old management, even holding a séance to try reviving the ghost of James Cash
Penney.
And it announced it would open for the holidays
this year on Thanksgiving evening, just like Macy's.
Macy's sued.
Exaggerations, of course, but only slightly.
JCPenney inhaled all the oxygen from the retail
world this year by an almost daily parade of news
- little of it good. Whether it was being dragged
through court by Macy's or being dragged through
the headlines by its board of directors, the once-pri-
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Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of VMSD - December 2013
VMSD - December 2013
Contents
From the Editor
VMSD Editoral Advisory Board
The Goods
Next Store
Who’s the Boss?
Setting the Stage
Top 10 of 2013
Made in America
High Finance
Euroshop 2014
Showroom
Ad Index
Checking Out
VMSD - December 2013
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