Richard Baum Quotations

Last year, they did this in conjunction with the Super Bowl, and the main target was the U.S.. This year's target was Europe. It's probably as big a deal in Europe as last year's was here.

Mike was a prime mover in the contemporary China field -- in some respects, the prime mover -- for much of the past three decades,

If they're not hitting the week's plan, they have to do something.

We think there's very few of them that can be long-term buys because of the fashion aspect of it, ... In Gap's case, what's happened here is that they've acknowledged that they have missed fashion but, in terms of their inventory management, they'll be delivering more frequently to the stores with less inventory commitment to each delivery. That should minimize their markdowns and improve their gross margins.

Ever since Tiananmen, of course, the U.S. has used human rights both as a barometer and as a weapon against China,

There's more art than science to this. Put yourself in their shoes. You don't have a crystal ball. You don't know what to expect.

The worst thing is to carry inventory over. Unless it's wine, it doesn't get better with age. It's basically better to sell it for 10 cents on a dollar than keep it.

It was a little bit slower than it has been, but consumer electronics and home furnishings are still very, very strong, ... If we were truly in a secular slowdown, we would see slowdowns in all categories.

The students in the square rained on Deng's parade,

The one thing that everybody kind of has tucked into the back of their minds is that if there is some sort of event that affects a mall between now and Christmas. It's hard to say whether another plane crash like this is going to have much of an impact yet.

So they're going to downplay Taiwan, they're going to downplay human rights.

Companies (retailers) are being very cautious about their guidance for the second quarter, so we're not completely taking it to heart that these (strong sales) results will carry through,

Zhao Ziyang, on the other hand, was very much at the centre of that particular storm, and thus will be harder to rehabilitate.

They shared the grievance that the government wasn't paying attention to ordinary people, that it was time to respond to the negative byproducts of economic reform. They considered the government to be arrogant, haughty and unresponsive.

They had come close to the edge of chaos and looked over, and they didn't like what they saw, ... Now they were saying that China needs time to heal its wounds, that we'll have gradual change instead.

They are coming up against a number of uncomfortable facts,

They have their planned promotions, but they have to be prepared to add some planned promotions in there if business is not happening.

It's very mixed. When you get into an environment like this, the extremes get magnified -- the good do better and the struggling do worse. It's like quicksand.

There was a sense of disbelief after June 4, ... People in China, even liberal intellectuals, were sobered by the crackdown and its ferocity.

I know people refer to this as Black Friday, but it's probably a Blue Friday. We think it's going to be a season that'll probably be not as strong as last year, but nonetheless we think the consumer is in pretty good shape.

Beijing is just testing its wings as a global player. This agreement is a major sign of China having achieved that stature.

Gap is experiencing weakness across all its brands, with its merchandise problems exacerbated by its aggressive square footage growth,