by Board Retailers Association | Jun 10, 2020 | Associate Members, Industry, News, Resources, Statistics
Please click on the following link to view this relevant Shop Eat Surf Article from BRA Supporting Vendor Partner Action Watch: Core Store Sales Better than Expected in May Be sure to visit the Shop Eat Surf website to view valuable Industry News and Resourceful Articles regularly via this link: Shop Eat Surf If you are not yet a BRA Retail Member, you can easily opt in to either Regular (no cost) or Distinguished ($99/yr.) Membership via this super simple join...
by Board Retailers Association | Jun 8, 2020 | Educational Opportunity, Resources, Retail Strategy, Social Issues
Welcome to this week’s Retail Resources. This week, I’m dedicating this post to what I believe are valuable resources to help retail business leaders fight racism and become better allies. If there’s anything you would like me to share in a future post, let me know by dropping me a line at mcampanelli@napco.com. LinkedIn has made its seven-course learning program “Diversity, Inclusion, and Belonging for All” free through the end of June. Courses include “Unconscious Bias,” “Skills for Inclusive Conversations,” “Bystander Training: From Bystander to Upstander,” and more. Check it our here.Korn Ferry is hosting a series of webinars this week called Race Matters. Topics range from how whites can become authentic allies in addressing systemic racism through structural inclusion to creating a racially equitable future as inclusive leaders, and more. For more information and to register, please click here.This Fast Company article discusses a plea from Aurora James, founder of the Brooklyn boutique Brother Vellies, for major retailers across the U.S. to commit to buying 15 percent of their merchandise from black-owned businesses. The campaign is dubbed the 15 Percent Pledge. “So many of your businesses are built on black spending power,” James wrote on Instagram. “So many of your stores are set up in black communities. So many of your sponsored posts are seen on black feeds. This is the least you can do for us. We represent 15 percent of the population, and we need to represent 15 percent of your shelf space.”The Female Quotient has put together a webinar series around how to “turn words into action, become true allies, and address racism head-on.” You can register for the series, called the “Virtual Equality Lounge®: Moving From Conversation to Action,” here.In this profound, thought-provoking and often...
by Board Retailers Association | Jun 2, 2020 | Industry, News, Resources
Please click on the following link to view this absolutely relevant Shop Eat Surf Article about BRA Supporting Vendor Partner ENDVR: Training Sales Associates in the Post-COVID World Be sure to visit the Shop Eat Surf website to view valuable Industry News and Resourceful Articles regularly via this link: Shop Eat Surf If you are not yet a BRA Retail Member, you can easily opt in to either Regular (no cost) or Distinguished ($99/yr.) Membership via this super simple join...
by Board Retailers Association | May 27, 2020 | News, Resources, Retail Strategy
Facebook and Instagram have launched a new Shop feature, allowing consumers to make purchases directly on businesses’ Facebook pages or Instagram profiles, reports TechCrunch. The social network’s (Facebook own Instagram) new tools go further than its previous support of e-commerce, enabling businesses to create a full-fledged Facebook Shop. The release of the new feature is a global test, with nearly 1 million businesses already signed up. Those businesses will be able to create a Facebook Shop for free — they just upload their catalog, choose the products they want to feature, then customize it with a cover image and accent colors. Visitors can then browse, save and order products. Facebook’s Vice President of Ads Dan Levy described this as a “build once and render anywhere” solution. What will differ is how consumers discover the shops, whether it’s via the Facebook Marketplace or a product tagged in a photo on Instagram. The company also plans to launch another experience this summer called Instagram Shop, and there will also be ways for merchants to feature and link to products in their live videos from their Facebook Stores, as well as for consumers to connect loyalty programs to their Facebook accounts. Total Retail’s Take: As social commerce continues to grow, it only makes sense that platforms would move to make the purchasing experience more seamless. It stands to reason that by adding more frictionless shopping features, consumers will spend more time in the app discovering and purchasing from brands. Facebook and Instagram are also creating additional advertising opportunities as they move toward being an e-commerce marketplace. Instagram had already moved in this direction in 2019 when it launched...
by Board Retailers Association | May 22, 2020 | Educational Opportunity, Industry, News, Resources, Retail Strategy
In this valuable webinar, Dan Jablons of Retail Smart Guys (https://www.retailsmartguys.com) will provide some guidance for independent retailers like you to help open your stores after Covid-19. This super informative webinar will cover store layouts, staffing, marketing, selling, merchandising, and financial steps that retailers need to take in order to successfully reopen your stores after having been shut down. Board Retailers Association specially arranged for Dan to present this helpful and relevant webinar to our retailers. When?: Dan originally presented this valuable and relevant webinar on Thursday, May 21, 2020 but is now available on demand anytime. Where?: Right here. Just push play. Why?: Because Board Retailers Association is a nonprofit that cares deeply about specialty retailers and provides resources like this to not only help specialty retailers like you to reopen your doors but also to lower your day to day costs, increase your profit margins and create more remarkable customer experiences. Not already a BRA Regular (no cost) or Distinguished Retail Member? You can easily opt in via this super simple join form: https://www.boardretailers.org/join-bra/ BONUS In addition to the video, we received some other materials from Dan Jablons of Retail Smart Guys related to the presentation to share with you upon request including: A copy of all the slides of the presentation A Checklist to do the things that are mentioned in the presentation! Management One’s 12 Week Cash Flow Plan – A great tool to ensure that you know where your cash flow is headed. It will help you make the important decisions you need to make to keep your cash!Management One’s PPP Planner – For...
by Board Retailers Association | May 21, 2020 | News, Resources, Retail Strategy
Brief: Facebook unveiled Facebook Shops, a new feature to help small businesses in the U.S. turn their social media profiles into digital storefronts. Businesses can set up a single online store for customers to access on Facebook’s core social network and photo-sharing app Instagram, according to an announcement and details shared by CEO Mark Zuckerberg during a livestream Tuesday.Shops will let businesses have online conversations with their customers via the WhatsApp, Messenger and Instagram Direct messaging platforms. Facebook introduced privacy controls that won’t identify which individuals visit a digital storefront, unless they give permission to do so. The company is currently testing Facebook Checkout to handle sales transactions, CNBC reported.Shops also will let businesses tag products shown in Facebook and Instagram livestreams, letting customers see a product order page after tapping on those tags, Zuckerberg said during the livestreamed event. The company is working with e-commerce partners including Shopify, BigCommerce, WooCommerce, ChannelAdvisor, CedCommerce, Cafe24, Tienda Nube and Feedonomics to support small businesses with Facebook Shops. Insight: Facebook’s introduction of Shops expands on past efforts to bolster mobile commerce, while the coronavirus pandemic has added urgency to helping small businesses whose brick-and-mortar stores were ordered to temporarily close. Facebook has previously said that its core ad business is seeing weaker demand due to the pandemic, but e-commerce is on the rise among quarantined consumers who can’t go to physical stores to buy goods. Shops could help Facebook capitalize on this opportunity and accelerate adoption for the shoppable features it’s been steadily building out over the past several years that look to give a stronger competitive edge against companies like Amazon. The social networking giant plans to expand the...
