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How Retailers are Preparing For Hurricane Gustav

Found in: Twitter
Sunday
August 31, 2008
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Hurricane Gustav continues to develop into a monster storm in the Gulf of Mexico. With the tragic lessons learned from Hurricane Katrina, residents and retailers alike are taking a more proactive approach to the arrival of this hurricane.

Yesterday, I talked about how well Home Depot was using their Twitter account to communicate hurricane tips and store information. Taking a look at the Home Depot Twitter, it appears that they have a dozen stores staying open all night in the Gulf Coast area. They’ve also brought in out of town volunteers to work the stores, allowing the local employees to secure their homes and evacuate. In addition to providing valuable information online, they’re also bringing supplies to the communities in need and staying open to allow people the time to get what they need. Home Depot also offers a section on their website with a wealth of information related to hurricane preparation.

The Wall Street Journal profiled the Walmart emergency operations center in Bentonville. Within the operations center, the retailer monitors the storm, communicates with the stores in the path of the storm, and plans on how to bring needed supplies, merchandise, and resources to the affected region. Walmart rapidly deployed resources to the Gulf Coast region after Hurricane Katrina in 2005 and can serve as a model for retailer involvement in disaster relief.

Winn-Dixie has a list of their store closings on their website. Nola.com has several photos showing a very empty Winn-Dixie in New Orleans.

Publix is the sponsor of a website called Hurricane Gustav Resources. This website seems to be a great resource of shelters that are open and evacuation information.

Obvious business motives aside, it is great to see these businesses working so hard to assist their communities. If you know of other retailers working to assist the Gulf Coast, please let me know in the comments.


Photo from Flickr user Maitri, used under Creative Commons.

Hurricane Gustav, Home Depot, and Twitter

Found in: Natural Disasters, Retail, Twitter
Saturday
August 30, 2008
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As the Gulf Coast of the United States makes preparations for the impact of Hurricane Gustav, I have to say that I am very impressed by the way Home Depot is using Twitter to communicate preparation tips and store information. The Home Depot Twitter account, which is generally filled with helpful home improvement tips, has switched gears to provide information targeted to Gulf Coast residents and those who are in the path of the storm.

Recent updates today have included general hurricane preparation tips about moving appliances, the danger of carbon monoxide from emergency generators, and reminding people to locate their main water and electric shut off switches. There has also been information about store closings and the availability of water.

This is a great use of Twitter by a retailer. They’re using the service to focus communication on information related to this very dangerous storm. I see this as a way for the retailer to assist the community that it serves. Good job by Home Depot.

My thoughts go out to everyone in the path of the storm.

Express Lane for 6/4/2006

Found in: Express Lane
Sunday
June 4, 2006
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First in maybe a weekly column? Hopefully.

Some quick retail notes for this lazy Sunday:

I hear that the new Abrecrombie & Fitch Back To School Preview floorset is this week. The seasonal transition at A&F is very impressive and seamless. Sales will be strong but it will be tough for A&F to compete with themselves and the high comps they had with BTS 2005 (June, July & August had comps of 38%, 22% & 24% in 2005). Look for solid increases in the gross margin with decreases in markdowns and sales for this upcoming season. This will be another great season for A&F.

Two quickies from the Loss Prevention blog: Cop kills man in grocery store shoplifting and Kroger manager jumps on hood of shoplifter’s car. I have nothing to say about the unfortunate shooting, but I’m sure Kroger’s corporate management doesn’t look fondly on employees jumping on cars to apprehend shoplifters. There has to be more to the story than that.

Last week, the Chicago Sun-Times ran an article showing where some of the former Sears executives have gone: Life After Sears.

And finally, a story from Starbucks showing how a good idea from worker, combined with the support of co-workers, the corporate office and customers can lead to a very positive outcome: Starbucks worker brews plan to get java to GIs in Afghanistan. A Starbucks employee from Maine organized a campaign where her co-workers donated their weekly bag of coffee they recieve as a benefit and, with corporate approval, solicited donations from customers. The result? 106 pounds of coffee sent to troops in Afghanistan. [via Starbucks Gossip]

Retail’s May numbers off to a positive Summer start

Found in: Monthly Retail Sales
Thursday
June 1, 2006
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The May comp store numbers for the retail industry:

In the mall: Abercrombie up 3.0, Aeropostale down 1.1, American Eagle up 11.0, Ann Taylor up 12.0 , Hot Topic down 6.0, Limited Brands up 7.0, and Pacific Sunwear down 2.6. Gap as a company was down 6.0, however the break down between companies is interesting. Gap North America was down 5.0, Gap International is down 13.0, Old Navy was down 8.0, but Banana Republic is starting to show signs of a turnaround with a 3.0 positive comp.

In the department store sector: Dillard’s up 3.0, Federated up 9.2, JC Penny up 11.1, Kohl’s up 3.1, Nordstrom up 7.8, and Saks up 5.7.

In the battle of Target v. Wal-Mart and warehouse stores v. warehouse stores, Target was up 5.7 & Wal-Mart was up 2.0. Sam’s Club was up 4.0 while BJ’s Wholesale was up 4.2 and Costco was up 10.0.

Generally a pretty positive month across the board. Gap continues to struggle and Kohl’s is curiously one of the few companies with positive marks that didn’t beat investor estimates. Pacific Sunwear was down 2.6 after a fantastic April in which they posted a 14.0 positive comp.

Minyanville posts a good roundup of the May numbers, covering some retailers I didn’t cover here.

Interesting month and a good start to the Summer season in retail.

Five ways you, as a customer, can improve customer service

Found in: Customer Service
Monday
May 29, 2006
2 Comments

Here is one thing I believe in: customer service is not one way street.

Customers, as well as businesses they deal with, have an obligation to better customer service. Customer service cannot go from bad to good if the company doesn�t know that they are providing bad customer service. On the same hand, customer service cannot continue to be good or great if the company doesn�t know that they are already providing that level of service. It is important for the customer to communicate with whoever they are able to in order to help build good customer service relationships.

I�d like to share with you five ways that you, as a customer, can improve customer service in the places that you shop. Although the scope of this post is geared towards retail, restaurants, and industries where customer interaction is one-on-one, the basic tenets that I will describe can be applied to almost all of our business relationships.

Most of these ways should seem simplistic and obvious, but that’s the point. Talking to friends and family, it doesn’t seem that a lot of people are doing these incredibly simple and easy things that they can be doing to help businesses improve customer service.

For a little back story as to why I wrote this, check out my other post: On poor customer service and me being a poor customer.

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