Need high-level help with a de-listing?

How about trying a trump card?

International Business Times reports that President Trump has tweeted against retailer Nordstrom for dropping Ivanka’s fashion line: "My daughter Ivanka has been treated so unfairly by ‪@Nordstrom. She is a great person -- always pushing me to do the right thing! Terrible!"

A pointer for well-connected NAMs everywhere?

Amazon's supermarket of the future could operate with just 3 staff - and lots of robots

According to the New York Times (as quoted in Business Insider) both Amazon Go and the new supermarkets (10,000 to 40,000 sq. ft. two storey) would contain no cashiers, no registers, and no lines. Instead, they would rely on an app on customer's phones that would detect items picked off shelves for purchase.

No one really expected Amazon to simply make a better version of what is available…

The issue for other retailers has to be how to find ways of copying – and improving upon – these amateur shopkeepers who realise that all a consumer wants on the shop floor are 4,000 items that shoppers "like to touch," such as fresh meat, fruit, vegetables, and eggs, while robots complete the shopping list upstairs..

Meanwhile, suppliers need to figure out ways of keeping their brands on that shopping list. 

What about the complainers that don't...?

Tesco Continues Recovery with Solid Q3 and Christmas Trading Results

Tesco latest Trading Results sugests the following Implications for NAMs:

Where at: In a relatively flat demand environment, it could be said that Tesco is growing at the expense of Asda and Sainsbury’s in the mults channel and slowing the growth of the discounters, at best

Where headed: For this to continue, Tesco will have to sustain its relative competitive appeal…

Effect on you: This has to mean continued pressure on resisting supplier cost price increases…

Action: Essential that branded NAMs reassess the degree of match between their consumer profiles and the traffic-profiles of individual mults, as a basis for differentiated trade strategies that optimise supplier labelling of customers as invest, maintain or divest, and negotiate their cost-price increases accordingly

Food Suppliers Squeezed As Recovering Supermarkets Push To Remain Competitive

Latest news of cost-increase resistance by buyers raise the following issues for NAMs:

Where at: Surprise, surprise! Whilst pragmatic NAMs do not expect retail buyers to roll over and accept cost-price increases, some state of equilibrium will be required to minimise supplier concentration and less choice…

Where headed: …if fewer, more powerful suppliers emerge in the coming months

Effect on you: Smaller players in niche categories can survive by optimising their (realistic) place in the market

Action: Time to revisit fundamentals of real consumer demand vs. available alternatives to define core proposition. Then numbers, numbers, numbers to calculate cost and value and build a financial rationale

Alternative use of redundant retail space?

    King's Mall, Hammersmith

Disappointing Results for Discounters whilst Tesco and Morrisons Continue their Recovery

Latest News of Christmas trading raise the following implications for NAMs:

Where at: The combination of intense price-warfare and consumer expectation ‘that 2017 will be more expensive’ gave a boost to most Christmas sales, while suppliers and retailers absorbed pent-up cost-price increases

Where headed: Q1 will reflect real world conditions in terms of price increases i.e. a re-set in relative performance where historical performance counts less..

Effect on you: Opportunities for pro-active NAMs while competitors await trends and perhaps an expectation of a return to normal

Action: Why not assume that you are re-launching everything in Q1 and re-assess your relative competitive appeal on that basis?

2017: When more is required, NamNews can help...

M&S Agrees To Grocery Price Rises Following Supplier Threats

Marks & Spencer has reportedly accepted wholesale price rises of up to 15% on some of its grocery lines after suppliers threatened to withdraw their products.

Where at: Clearly at the limits of supplier & retailer cost absorption, with ‘public’ announcements best left to the post-agreement stage

Where headed: Some face-saving rationalisation, knowing that scale savings rarely transfer directly into significant reductions in cost of production

Effect on you: opportunity for NAMs in other customers to watch from the ringside, and learn from premature moves

Action: Stick to defensible price increases based on latest analysis of competitor and customer financials…

2017: A year of political tweaking?