Jonathan Marek

As someone who works in SF, I have to say this is emblematic of the city. At a small scale, for high-end, expensive goods, everyone loves this idea. But no one could ever afford to produce something at a value-oriented price point in SF. Plus, as soon as a...

I'm not sure anything to do with Michael Jackson can be generalized. Alive or dead, he was one of a kind. Given that Pepsi and Jackson have been associated for a long time, I see this as more of a nostalgia play, evoking '80s memories.

It's a good idea, but doesn't it feel 5 years too late? With the lead Amazon has in this space, I think it will be hard for Google to make a big impact.

Sephora is a perfect testbed for truly integrating digital into the real-world store experience. I love the idea of having real-time visuals (how would I look in this?), background material on the cosmetics, info on what is selling elsewhere and online -- all for customers and experts to interact...

This is why building an outstanding test and learn capability is critical to major retailers. By testing self-checkout in a balanced subset of stores, retailers can understand the incremental impact on both sales and theft (and satisfaction and labor costs, etc.). Further, they can understand what types of locations...

Very interesting set of thoughts here. Right now, there are many complex schemes emerging to trade understanding of shopper behavior for specific rewards. It seems too complex to me.

What will eventually emerge will need to be something that is much simpler for consumers. The value of cash money...

People do all kinds of things to get discounts. That is my concern about this. With stronger incentives to have a better Klout score, you change the nature of the "social" interactions. In the end, you may end up with influencer scores that aren't reflective of actual influence (i.e.,...

I don't see it. I'm sure there are some opportunities, but how could these players be "game-changers"? Isn't "lower price" already the leading value proposition for many pure play online retailers? Isn't one of the biggest emerging threats for physical retailers that consumers are increasingly using mobile devices to...

I love receipt tape based surveys, as they put control in my hands without bugging me. But the constant email barrage of "you stayed in my hotel (or whatever) now rate it" is certainly annoying.

Before I started actually analyzing data from those opt-in surveys, I would have assumed...

Wawa treats their business like any great retailer. They innovate and then relentlessly execute. That they are doing it in the c-store space, where companies often go awry on both counts, makes it more impressive, not less impressive.

Given real estate costs closer to New York, expanding in their...