Phony 'Poland
It’s springtime for New England lawyers who contend Nestle's 'Poland Natural Spring Water' doesn’t come from an actual spring. The suit contends the #1 US bottled water brand original spring in Maine dried up 50 years ago.
Iowa's #1 adds
Iowa's #1 office supplier, Storey Kenworthy (DesMoines) has bought regional neighbour to consolidate its leading state wide market position
The Up-Lyft-ing
Lyft, the #2 transportation service company has beaten #1 rival Uber Technologies. to an initial public offering (IPO), and that’s important for a number of reasons. We review its history & prospects
Antalis' adversity
Europe's #1 paper merchant, ailing Antalis confirmed its continued decline in Q4'18 first reported on 8 Feb The CEO is in denial with his "in line with objectives" rhetoric; no growth or reinvention strategy, apart from packaging; as it steers towards the sunset
Cut 'CostToServe' Hidden costs are a burden to productivity for distributors & customers. Growing competition is forcing businesses to digitize to stay productive & maximize use of technology, to boost profitability. We explore options & best practice .... Updated
ServiceNow stars
Leading digital workflow productivity provider to the enterprise market ServiceNow recently reported stellar results. We discuss with CEO John Donahoe his "make work better for people" mantra & report on Compass case study
Deceptive Depot
Office Depot & software partner Support.com have been fined $35m by FTC for tricking users into buying costly & needless PC repair services. Nothing's changed in the dirty Depot culture since 2005
ArjoWiggins works
Administrators at the Arjowiggins UK fine papermakers operations are working with a preferred bidder for a large part of the business and hope to conclude a deal next month.
Fraudster Lynch
Hewlett-Packard botched its $11Bn buy of Autonomy and then tried to cover up its incompetence by accusing the UK software company’s founder Mike Lynch of fraud, a London court was told
Omnichannel
Internet Retailer’s 2019 Omnichannel Report reveals which top retailers execute omnichannel services best. Amazon's well-designed execution now raises the stakes for other merchants.
Scintillating
Synnex, the $20Bn IT supply wholesaler, has enjoyed resurgent organic growth since 2016 aided recently by big acquisitions inc. Converys
Overstock over
Failing furniture & business etailer, $1.8Bn in sales, Overstock again
reported heavy losses in Q4'19, as continued to seek withdrawal from its core ecommerce business. How much longer can its CEO survive?
Sycamore: Stick
Sycamore Partners, which bought Staples in 2017 for $7Bn, is planning to recapitalize and load the bigbox with $5Bn+ in debt. Is the vulture capitalist planning an IPO, or typically a sell off, and if so to whom?
Antalis chief's
Leading European merchant Antalis is “driving the process” of selling on majority shareholder Sequana’s shares as the group files bankruptcy & papermaker partner Arjowiggins goes into administration. Why the defence & denial?
Is Wayfair retail
Wayfair, the leading international home & office furnishings etailer will open its first retail store later this year, in the Natick Mall (MA). Shouldn't Wayfair address its core customer service issues first?
Apple bites back
Is Apple losing its lustre? CEO Tim Cook announced its upcoming TV streaming service amongst other subscription services at its “It’s show time” launch event yesterday. The jury's out on its ability to excite the Apple Nation....
"Tomorrow's News Today,
not yesterday's news tomorrow."
Death of Indie
Does size matter? The office market over the past 35yrs has been dominated by bigboxes & Amazon's lead in business supplies, points to a continuation. But emerging trends show the big guys are declining fast & Amazon peaking. The rise of progressive resellers providing 'personalised productivity services' embracing mobile technology, can & will succeed.. Tomorrow
'Industry Week'
The Business Supplies Association (BSA) plan to rationalise vendors' heavy schedule of 20+pa shows & create an 'Industry Week' has been quashed. Understandably, leading wholesalers & resellers wouldn't cooperate. Great idea, so what's Plan B? We feel consideration be given to a more customer centric 'Business Productivity Show' for the IDC. We spoke w/BSA pres Barry Lane... Monday
Do Workplace
Company workplace wellness programs — efforts to get workers to lose weight, eat better, stress less and sleep more — are an $8 billion industry in the U.S. Recent research reports heathier behaviour, but not necessarily healthier results? We discuss findings...
User behaviour
Marketing Week's Charlotte Rogers reports that research shows marketers are shifting away from classic demographics to find more accurate ways to segment users based on their behaviour and personal interests...Updated
Sycamore Partnrs:
Vulture capitalist Sycamore Partners owner of Staples & Essendant recently hiked the former's debt load by $1Bn to $5.2Bn, with estimated interest payments of $400m+ pa or c3%/sales. Many analysts ask: Is this a repeat of the ToysR Us bankruptcy situation; and Sycamore's Nine West demise? We discuss... Complete
Retail retreat
The NYTimes reported yesterday that "planned retail store closures in the US already exceed 2018 total". A similar story applies in bigbox business supplies, with Staples & Depot expected to merge or accelerate closures this year...
Staples rebrand
Staples rebrand of its logo, webstore and 5 new private labels under the 'WorklifeFulfilment' byline has attracted much interest in marketing circles e.g. Forbes. We discuss the comments, criticisms and conclusions ...Updated
Marketing to baby
Marketing segmentation this century has coralled consumers into age groups: Baby Boomers, 'GenY' aka 'Millennials' & 'GenZ'. Its not working its 'marketing mush'. It's more about attitude not age writes FT's Michael Skarpinker
Batten down for
Economic data across advanced global economies have deteriorated since Q3'18, indicating fading growth and the need to prepare for slowing demand reports the Financial Times. Gear your business to help customers save money & time... Provide Managed Productivity Services! Here's how....
Private L a b e l
Staples launch of 'Worklife Fulfilment' products is the latest bigbox to push private label following Amazon, Depot's Workonomy; and fated Adveo & old OfficeMax iterations. Meanwhile, core delivery service competence drags. What's the motive? Where's the valid user research? Where's the vendor partnership? Updated
'Fakebook' fraud?
A c m e United