Sales & Marketing

Everyone is talking about the huge impact millennials are having on retail. Also known as Gen Y, they are usually considered to occupy the 18-to-35 age demographic. But what about Gen Z, the younger siblings (or even children) of millennials?
 
Based on what we’ve seen so far, here are three ways Gen Z will change retail in the next few years.
 
Video Killed the Retail Star

Birchbox has added two new executives to enhance the customer experience, hiring VPs in product management and creative.

Terre Layton was named global VP of product management and user experience, responsible for global product management, the product strategy and roadmap, and the user experience. She most recently worked at Sephora, where she served as head of front-end product management and led strategic digital innovation projects. She has also consulted for several beauty retailers and e-commerce companies.

Five retail chains rank among the top 10 brands doing a poor job when it comes to emotional engagement, a measure of how well brands meet consumer expectations, according to an annual survey.

A surprising decline in retail hiring helped trigger a weak employment report for April.

Job growth in April slowed sharply to a seven-month low. The report gave back growth seen earlier in the year, and the retail industry — excluding automobiles, gasoline and restaurants — showed a decline of 4,900 jobs, the National Retail Federation reported.

Women now make up the majority of the leadership team at Best Buy, theStar Tribunereported, with the retailer reaching the tipping point in April when it hired Trish Walker from Accenture as president of services. Having more gender diversity has been a commitment of Best Buy CEO Hubert Joly, who took over in September 2012, the report said.

Online consumers appear to be remembering Mom this year.

According to new data from the Adobe Digital Index, online sales in the important Mother’s Day gift categories of flowers/gifts and jewelry are both trending 2%-3% higher than they were in 2015.

The employees who once greeted shoppers with a friendly “Welcome to Walmart” are making a comeback.

Walmart is reviving and updating its door-greeter program in an effort to improve customer service and also deter shoplifting.

The greeters were the invention of company founder Sam Walton, who saw them as a way to put a friendly face on the chain’s large stores. But in recent years, most of the employees who served as greeters were moved to other parts of the store.

Slow traffic at its California stores proved a drag for Costco Wholesale Corp. in April.

The retailer reported flat same-store sales in April, below analysts’ estimates of a 1.2% increase.

Total sales in April rose 3% to $8.98 billion, helped by strength in Canada.

Excluding gasoline-price fluctuations and currency exchange rates, U.S. same-store sales rose 2%, below estimates for growth of 3.4%. Same-store sales in Canada increased 2% overall and 7% when excluding gas prices and currency.