Best Buy Expands Private Label Brands†

Wall Street Journal, April 27, 2009 — Best Buy Co. is rapidly expanding its private-label electronics business in a gamble to gain a key competitive advantage over rivals such as Wal-Mart Stores Inc. and Amazon.com Inc.

Best Buy believes it can prosper in private-label electronics — an area that has historically flummoxed U.S. retailers — by using the mountains of customer feedback it collects from its stores to make simple innovations to established electronic gadgetry. The move comes as Best Buy's position in the consumer electronics market has strengthened in the past year following the liquidation of former rival Circuit City Stores Inc.

Best Buy Expands Private-Label Brands†

Wall Street Journal, April 27, 2009 — Best Buy Co. is rapidly expanding its private-label electronics business in a gamble to gain a key competitive advantage over rivals such as Wal-Mart Stores Inc. and Amazon.com Inc.

Best Buy believes it can prosper in private-label electronics — an area that has historically flummoxed U.S. retailers — by using the mountains of customer feedback it collects from its stores to make simple innovations to established electronic gadgetry.

Best Buy Confronts Newer Nemesis†

With Circuit City Gone, Electronics Retailer Arms Its 'Blue Shirt' Sales Force to Take On Wal-Mart

Wall Street Journal, March 17, 2009 — Finally victorious over longtime archrival Circuit City Stores Inc., Best Buy Co. is now gearing up to fight an even more powerful foe: Wal-Mart.

Leading the challenge will be Brian Dunn, the company's chief operating officer, who takes over for retiring Chief Executive Brad Anderson in June. His new strategy is to head off Wal-Mart Stores Inc.'s brutal price competition by giving consumers something the discounter cannot: more interactive stores, where customers can step into the world of a new videogame or see their faces captured by a high-definition video camera, instead of trolling aisles stacked with merchandise.

Best Buy Confronts Newer Nemesis†

With Circuit City Gone, Electronics Retailer Arms Its 'Blue Shirt' Sales Force to Take On Wal-Mart

Wall Street Journal, March 16, 2009 — Finally victorious over longtime archrival Circuit City Stores Inc., Best Buy Co. is now gearing up to fight an even more powerful foe: Wal-Mart.

Leading the challenge will be Brian Dunn, the company's chief operating officer, who takes over for retiring Chief Executive Brad Anderson in June. His new strategy is to head off Wal-Mart Stores Inc.'s brutal price competition by giving consumers something the discounter cannot: more interactive stores, where customers can step into the world of a new videogame or see their faces captured by a high-definition video camera, instead of trolling aisles stacked with merchandise.

Samsung: Rethinking the Printer Business

Samsung's bet that eye-catching design, and a partnership with Apple, would boost its share of the printer market is paying off

BusinessWeek, January 5, 2009 — In September 2007, Apple (AAPL) upstaged rival electronics retailers with a new product available only at its 180 stores. Billed as the world's smallest laser printer, the SCX-4500 offered all the must-have features of an Apple blockbuster: sleek good looks, buttonless touch controls, and easy set-up. The logo on the front, though, wasn't Apple's. It belonged to Samsung Electronics—one of the biggest suppliers of flat-panel televisions, cellular phones, and refrigerators in retailing—which created the stunning, piano-black printer. Intent on toppling industry giant Hewlett-Packard (HPQ), the South Korean consumer electronics giant spent three years working on its first designer printer before teaming up with Apple for its introduction.

Dell Lags in New Products†

Dell isn't launching a digital music player for the holidays, adding to concerns that it is lagging behind rivals in fresh offerings.

Wall Street Journal, November 10, 2008 — Michael Dell last year promised innovative new consumer products to generate "product lust" and spark his company's turnaround effort. But in the runup to the holiday sales season, Dell Inc. has been slow to deliver on that promise.

Three Marketing Initiatives Key to Breakout B2C Brand Growth

Marketing Charts, November 4, 2008 — Placing disciplined focus on three key business-to-consumer marketing initiatives and executing them properly helps top brands achieve “category killing” performance and can make a difference in market-share growth of up to 30%, according to research from the Marketing Leadership Council, a division of the Corporate Executive Board.

“Breakout Growth: Practical Lessons from Brands that Consistently Outperform Competitors,” sheds new light on how certain brands -despite fluctuations in economic and environmental conditions - are able to to exhibit breakout performance, growing at two to three times their category average.

Stay-at-Home Trend Feathers Samsung Nest†

Fewer Families Going Out Means More Sales of HDTV, Sound Systems

Advertising Age, November 3, 2008 — Steven Cook came to Samsung Electronics America a little over a year ago, after 13 years at Coca-Cola and another 13 years before that at Procter & Gamble. Mr. Cook said Samsung now sits at No. l or No. 2 in most of its product categories, similar to successful classic consumer-package-goods makers. With the commoditization of electronics — much like package goods — his job is to continue to differentiate Samsung as a premium brand.

Best Buy Launches Store For and By Women

Springwise Newsletter, October 7, 2008 — Reflecting the fact that women make the majority of consumer purchase decisions these days, a number of companies have begun exhibiting signs of female fever, as our sister site trendwatching.com would put it. We've already covered instances in the automotive, construction and transportation industries, to name a few, and now consumer electronics giant Best Buy appears to have succumbed as well.

This past weekend Best Buy opened a new store in Aurora, Colo., that was designed with women in mind. Specifically, the company asked 40 local female customers and its own Women’s Leadership Forum—or WoLF pack—to participate in the design of the new store.

The Contribution Revolution: Letting Volunteers Build Your Business†

Intuit’s cofounder challenges traditional companies to follow the lead of internet superstars—and of innovative peers such as Honda, Procter & Gamble, and Hyatt—in tapping the contributions of countle

Harvard Business Review, October 1, 2008 — Earlier this year, I spent an intense half-day closeted in a room with the top 70 executives at Intuit. Our aim was to come up with ways that people outside the company could volunteer their time, energy, and expertise to make life better for our customers. Sound odd? Well, if you’re not conducting an exercise like that at your organization, you risk missing the boat on a sea change that’s transforming business.

Every day, millions of people make all kinds of voluntary contributions to companies—from informed opinions to computing resources—that create tremendous value for those firms’ customers and, consequently, for their shareholders. When I first encountered this idea, several years ago, it struck me as unfathomable: Volunteerism was for... continue reading