Month: July 2011

Exactly how many competitors do you have?

How many categories of competition are there? Roughly, two! Yes, textbooks talk about brand competition, total budget competition, substitutes, etc., but I prefer to think that there are two basic categories of competition: Direct and Indirect. Direct competition is anyone who gets up every day with the specific, deliberate goal of taking that business you would […]

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Bye-bye self service?

Albertson’s is bidding farewell to all its self-service checkout lanes. The move offers Albertson’s a fair amount of “attaboys” because in addition to restoring a more human touch to the checkout process, in order to offer that human touch, more humans will have to be hired, so they get to look like heroes for doing their part […]

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Not just blowing smoke?

Regulators have ordered tobacco companies to put more serious warning labels on cigarette packages. There are several visuals tobacco companies will be allowed to choose from, but they will be required to have one on every pack of cigarettes they sell. If you haven’t seen these yet, you might want to brace yourself before you click […]

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Go where they ain’t?

Someone once asked Willie Sutton why he robbed banks. He replied simply, “Because that’s where the money is!” So should it be with the selection of our target markets. Today’s Wal-Mart strikes fear into the hearts of competitors worldwide, competing in the biggest, toughest markets. But they didn’t start out that way. Sam Walton began with what […]

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