Howard Davidowitz Custom Quotations

The name of the game for Ben and Jerry's is to get someone to taste the product. If this promotion can get more customers in the doors, there's a reasonable chance that many of them may return later (when they charge full price).

There is no loyalty to a store -- that's what Federated has gone to school and found out. The place with the best product at the right time and at the right price, that's where the customer loyalty is.

This is specially true of the specialty stores. Retailers have to become more creative if they want to keep customers longer in their stores and if they want them to keep coming back.

In retailing, the whole name of the game is to feed off your competitors' footsteps. Wal-Mart is the biggest traffic generator around. It gets over 150 million customers a week.

Lean inventories won't help retailers this year if they can't lure customers into their stores.

Within the retail industry Federated is known for catering to the classes and May to the masses. For the May customer, it's an opportunity to get more upscale merchandise that a Bloomingdales' customer is familiar with.

If you look at Helen of Troy's customer base, sales are generally strong. Wal-Mart sales are up, Target sales are up,

Wal-Mart sees banking as an opportunity to give the customer a better deal. That's what Wal-Mart's about. That's why they have demolished the food and toy industries. If it's better for the customers, then that's the way it ought to be.