Mervyn's Tries Dollar Store-Within-The-Store

I'm with Beder -- sounds pretty desperate to me too.

Ryan Mathews, Founder, ceo, Black Monk Consulting

I heartily endorse this approach. HEB is experimenting with "dollar aisles" and I see it elsewhere, too. Most shoppers have little idea of what they are actually paying for things. The dollar section proclaims, in a way that nothing else can, "This is a value shopping place."

Herb Sorensen, Ph.D., Scientific Advisor TNS Global Retail & Shopper, Adjunct Senior Fellow, Ehrenberg-Bass Institute

I can't imagine how many more store groups will waste resources dabbling in dollar concepts before Wal-Mart (and possibly Target), achieve critical dollar store "mass" and blow them all away.

Carol Spieckerman, President, newmarketbuilders

After seeing this question on Mervyn's dollar-within-a-store tactic, I read Mervyn's $1 items" ad in this morning's paper. Then, in a quest for "discovery", I went to a Mervyn's, and have just returned. For me ... there's a difference between normally higher-priced "surplus" brand items that sell for a discount at a $1 in "Dollar Stores" versus the mostly noodnick items that are only worth a dollar. It seems to this observer that Mervyn's, in a tactical effort to discover its strategic mind - has ungrudgingly offered its latest "sunrise" discovery to a world that's not waiting for its $1 sunrise. It's a rather weak "me too" deja vu.

Gene Hoffman, President/CEO, Corporate Strategies International

Mervyn's tactics smacks of trying to be all things to all people. On the surface it would appear that there is strategic brand confusion internally. This is a repeat of the mistakes so many other retailers have made. This approach was the beginning of the end for Scotty's, a one-time major regional player in the home-improvement superstore category and has been tested by several grocery retailers without success.

The investment would be better spent managing the brand experience in the stores...providing an experience that warrants customer loyalty by redesigning the weakest points in the Mervyn's shopping experience. Doodads for a Dollar might be a seasonal promotional success, but won't be a merchandising winner for the brand.

Ultimately the questions to be answered are, "What are we going to be when we grow up?" and, "Why should they (our target market) care?"

D. Wendal Attig, CEO, The Advisory Team

A major strength of dollar stores is food items. If Mervyn's can't or won't deliver that part of the equation (I just don't see canned goods in their stores), then they'd better be able to source some very compelling items to retail for $1-5. And that addresses another strength of dollar stores, which is their established network of "remnant" brokers who provide a constant stream of discontinued and close-dated products.

One doesn't just "decide" to get in this business. It takes time, planning, expertise, product mix, and relationships.

M. Jericho Banks PhD, President, CEO, Forensic Marketing LLC

Whatever happened to doing what you do, and doing it well? This seems to me like a distraction and a lack of focus. However, Target (same parent) is doing the same thing. There may be some centralized effort there that could make this successful with the right product mix. But, they also are on the block. What happens when the parent is gone? Why introduce a new strategy when the best course is to keep yourself successful so that you have value to the suitor. New strategies in the midst of a sale simply don't make sense.

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