The Future of U.S. Retailing: An Agenda for the 21st Century

This book, the result of a symposium co-sponsored by several academic and professional organizations, provides information and insights useful for anyone aspiring to succeed in marketing to consumers in the 1990s. The book is unique in that it blends thoughtful commentaries of distinguished academics with the reasoned perspectives of executives of such firms as J. C. Penney, Avon, and Mary Kay in arriving at an agenda of critical propositions and issues relating to the nature and structure of retailing by the year 2000. What types of retailers will exist in the next century? How many retailers will there be? What will be the relationship between retailing and society? Questions such as these are asked and answered in the book. By focusing on likely trends in traditional retailing, direct marketing, direct selling, and multi-channel distribution networks, and overlaying these trends with the impact of technology and changing consumption patterns, the book provides a set of guidelines for achieving retailing success. The book identifies the single-most important key to success in the remainder of this century--relationship management. Only by managing relationships between the firm and its customers, between the firm and its employees, and between employees and customers will a firm be able to survive in the 1990s. As the book notes, retail leaders in the next millennium will have learned to respect the lifetime value of both their customers and employees. The book concludes by identifying 25 conditions that will face retailers in the 1990s. These conditions, which range from hypersaturated markets to demographic trends (income polarization, smaller households, educational decline, more working women, time poverty), database marketing, show biz shopping, and concerned customers, are likely to both inhibit and facilitate retailing in the remainder of the century. Hence, the book should be of interest to business academics, business practitioners engaged in, or wanting to be engaged in, marketing to consumers, and anyone interested in the future of retailing from a societal or public policy perspective.

Table of Contents:
Preface A Context for Retailing Predictions by Robert A. Peterson Retailing in the Year 2000: Quixotic Consumers? Exotic Markets? Neurotic Retailers? by Wilton Thomas Anderson Remarks by John C. Beyer Emerging Technology in Retailing: Challenges and Opportunities for the 1990s by Dale Achabal and Shelby McIntyre Remarks by David V. Evans Mass Merchandising/Traditional Retailing by Stanley C. Hollander and William W. Keep Remarks by Donald J. Stone The Direct/Database Marketing Challenge to Fixed-Location Retailers by Don E. Schultz Remarks by David Shepard Direct Selling in the Year 2000 by Thomas R. Wotruba Remarks by James E. Preston Multiple Channels of Distribution and Their Impact on Retailing by Gary L. Frazier and Tasadduq A. Shervani Remarks by William R. Davidson A Retailing Agenda for the Year 2000 by Richard Bartlett and Robert A. Peterson Index

About the Author :
ROBERT A. PETERSON holds the John T. Stuart III Centennial Chair in Business Administration and the Charles C. Hurwitz Fellowship at the University of Texas at Austin. He has authored or co-authored in excess of 120 articles and books.

Review :
?A significant contribution offering insights, perspectives, thought-provoking commentaries, and discussions on marketing to consumers in the next century. The volume, a result of a symposium, contains papers from leading retailing practitioners and academicians conversant with retailing theory and practice. The book provides a framework or foundation for simultaneously developing scenarios for future as well as present-day options for retailing leadership. Topics discussed include mass merchandising, direct/database marketing, direct selling, and multi-channel distribution networks. The volume stresses the importance of a firm's relationship with both its customers and employees. The last chapter, "A Retailing Agenda for the Year 2000," highlights 25 major issues (e.g., demographic trends, technology advances, consumption patterns) and 282 questions designed to stimulate strategic thinking and foster creativity and innovation in retailing. Comprehensive bibliography; brief notes about contributors. Should be of serious interest to retailing practitioners; to business academics and students, lower-division undergraduate and up; and to anyone interested in the future nature and structure of retailing.?-Choice "A significant contribution offering insights, perspectives, thought-provoking commentaries, and discussions on marketing to consumers in the next century. The volume, a result of a symposium, contains papers from leading retailing practitioners and academicians conversant with retailing theory and practice. The book provides a framework or foundation for simultaneously developing scenarios for future as well as present-day options for retailing leadership. Topics discussed include mass merchandising, direct/database marketing, direct selling, and multi-channel distribution networks. The volume stresses the importance of a firm's relationship with both its customers and employees. The last chapter, "A Retailing Agenda for the Year 2000," highlights 25 major issues (e.g., demographic trends, technology advances, consumption patterns) and 282 questions designed to stimulate strategic thinking and foster creativity and innovation in retailing. Comprehensive bibliography; brief notes about contributors. Should be of serious interest to retailing practitioners; to business academics and students, lower-division undergraduate and up; and to anyone interested in the future nature and structure of retailing."-Choice