Does anyone else kinda feel bad for JcPenney, or do they deserve the abuse?

[HeXen]

Retailers are going to go through the pains of change in similar fashion to how the music industry had to change. Took them a while to get it mostly right. Retailers will figure it out eventually and some may die out doing it.

 

[Cpus]

Yeah.. but their NEW CEO was the one who had the bright idea of bringing in Joe Fresh and creating those new "We're sorry about screwing up, please contact us on how to do better" commercials.

Gee... maybe you can start by inspecting the factories that your new products are made in before making a major investment in them? You would think that would be a given after the Apple/Foxconn PR debacle.

oh.

 

[Jeff7]

Geez... I almost forgot about the layoffs. It seems that they got rid of all of their good (AKA expensive) workers, and kept the folks making minimum wage. Yeah, that's gonna improve the shopping experience.

I love how so many places are doing that, too.

Customer experience doesn't show up (directly) on the balance books though, so it therefore doesn't matter. The mentality is, "Cut expenses, at (nearly) any cost. (Management pay is invariably exempted from this decree.)"


On the subject of the social media thing: As my employer gets into that arena, I also wonder how other companies handle that. Your Twitter or Facebook page isn't going to be used primarily by people who've gone and had an ordinary, or even positive, shopping experience. It's going to be used by pissed off people who've been unable to get satisfaction through the normal channels. So what's the option then? Just delete all the negative commentary? Then it just becomes little more than a marketing propaganda page of "Look how great we are! Zero dislikes! No one hates us!" (Though it is a marketing gimmick, so I guess that's to be expected.)

 

[Wyndru]

I love how so many places are doing that, too.

Customer experience doesn't show up (directly) on the balance books though, so it therefore doesn't matter. The mentality is, "Cut expenses, at (nearly) any cost. (Management pay is invariably exempted from this decree.)"

Unfortunately, they have to. Many of the long term employees are getting paid wages that were possible to pay during much better economic times, and they can't just make pay cuts to these people to match new wages.

These days if you have seniority at a job it's usually a bad thing (unless there is a contract that protects you based on your start date).

 

[olds]

Geez... I almost forgot about the layoffs. It seems that they got rid of all of their good (AKA expensive) workers, and kept the folks making minimum wage. Yeah, that's gonna improve the shopping experience.

I love how so many places are doing that, too...

I am surprised at how ignorant most retail people are about their products. They used to pay enough to keep good employees but not so much any more.

I was recently purchasing a camcorder. I wanted to touch it in person so I used B&M stores. The person at Frys had no business selling anything. I actually asked him if there was someone in the department that knew about the cameras. He brought a woman over that barely knew more then he did.

I went to Best Buy and that guy answered everyone of my questions and pointed out some things I hadn't thought of. I bought from Best Buy. I was so impressed I wrote to them about my experience.

 

[OlafSicky]

They have some bad luck but in today world it just seems lazy not to check how your stuff is made. Quick flight to the factory would have solved the issue. In my opinion there is no excuse.
I think Joe Fresh is owned by a Canadian company Lablaws owned by the Weston family. JcPenney was just selling the stuff. The death toll is 600 now.

 

[Ketchup]

My oversimplified version: higher prices for lower quality products. It's like driving to a Kmart and paying more for something you could get at a Target, which is closer.

 

[MaxPayne63]

Their two fathers/mothers day ads were also idiotic. That topic is way too political to make it in to an ad spot if your goal is to sell products.

With the shrinking middle class and the rise of online merchants it's inevitable that some of the department store chains will go belly up. JCP seems to have the dumbest management so it looks like it will be the first, but there will be more.

 

[Dari]

Price check. If they don't have an app that scans UPCs, and checks prices online, they should. Even without that convenience, a manual price check isn't difficult.

That was made for men. Women still prefer to spend all month in stores browsing and wasting my time then going over budget.

 

[DrPizza]

Go into ANY women's clothing store. At least 75% of the racks have a % off sale. There's a psychological reason this works - if something has a price of $20 on it, it doesn't sell as well as something that has a $60 price on it and 67% off. People think it has more value because of the higher price tag. People are... stupid. I think one of the classic examples that's used in marketing classes is tater tots. Basically, they're made from the scraps at Ore-Ida. They didn't know what to do with all those little slivers of leftover potato after slicing french fries. So, they mixed them with flour or whatever to hold them together, and sold them. The price was very low; since it was more or less recycled waste from the french fry cutting process. People perceived them as having very little value, since the price was low. In an insane twist, rather than lower prices to sell more, they RAISED prices and they increased sales.

JC Penney's marketing department is full of idiots - or rather, they probably had to listen to the idiot of a CEO they switched over to who was completely ignorant of clothing markets. Heck, "higher end" clothing companies figured out that for a marginal increase in quality - better fabrics, stitching, etc., adding a small pittance to the cost to manufacture those clothes, they could charge a huge premium.

 

[kranky]

I feel bad for the employees who are suffering due to the ex-Apple CEO's moves. When the downhill slide started, the talented experienced ones left while they could (beat the rush). And the slide lasted so long that they have no core customer base remaining. In retail it takes a long time to build up a base. The old core was alienated, and they don't seem to have what it takes to lure in new shoppers. They need to get people in the door to buy stuff no matter if they make money or not, just to get people in the habit of going there.

I used to buy dress shirts there when they had exact sleeve length shirts. When I got shirts I sometimes bought other things - belt, socks, ties. But one time I went back and they didn't carry shirts like that any more - just the 34/35 type lengths. Haven't been back since.

 

[Baked]

target clearance section is the shit! i hang around target all the time so i can buy their clearance, aka, overstocked stuff.

 

[ElFenix]

esplain

when getting my mom a watch for xmas i figured out what the total discount at kohl's was. something like 70% off the marked price. then i went to amazon and found the same model watch for another $20 off. not a sale or anything.

 

[Svnla]

JCP just starts the coupons again. I received the $10 off $10 last week.

 

[JEDI]

Price check. If they don't have an app that scans UPCs, and checks prices online, they should. Even without that convenience, a manual price check isn't difficult.

link to app for Droid?

 

[JEDI]

JCP just starts the coupons again. I received the $10 off $10 last week.

lol @ the flip flop

oh man their stok price is going to be low for a while.
switching strategies cost $ to implement.

switching it back to the old way costs even more $$$ because you've now:
1) alienated your core
2) have egg on your face by flip flopping
3) and now even less people will shop there because they perceive (correctly) that JCP dioesnt know what they are doing

 

[Jumpem]

My wife and I used to shop there regularly prior to the CEO change and "no sales" strategy. We started going to Kohl's and Macy's instead.

 

[lxskllr]

link to app for Droid?

I don't know if there is one. I don't have a smart phone, but I'd do a Play store search of "price scanner" or something like that. If it doesn't exist, I wonder why. That seems obvious to me, but it might require maintaining a database of products. Scan the item, query the database, then search for prices. Fairly simple. The database is the hard part. If something like that doesn't exist, I'd crowdsource it, and build one. That would make the app less immediately useful, but it would get better over time.

 

[SSSnail]

http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2317857

 

[Jeffg010]

That old CEO was full on retard. Not only did remove sales but he tried to steal Martha Stewart from Macy's. Good move dimwit get yourself in a huge lawsuit.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/business/2013/04/08/ron-johnson-penney-ceo/2064723/

 

[pontifex]

I don't shop there but I keep seeing their commercial where they say "we finally learned to listen to our customers". JC Penney has been in business a long time and they now finally realize that they should listen to customers?

 

[Aikouka]

I buy some clothes at JC Penney's, but ever since Johnson took over, they've had less of the stuff that I want. :\ All I want are tall-sized, button-down, short-sleeve dress shirts with a single breast pocket that are a solid color with the buttons the same color as the shirt (don't want to wear a tie). Is that really so much to ask for?

 

[Jeff7]

Unfortunately, they have to. Many of the long term employees are getting paid wages that were possible to pay during much better economic times, and they can't just make pay cuts to these people to match new wages.

These days if you have seniority at a job it's usually a bad thing (unless there is a contract that protects you based on your start date).

And of course, those who are laid off will likely find themselves a lower-paying job (or just sit back and enjoy our relatively-new infinite-unemployment), and thus need the lower prices that are (theoretically) permitted by the reduction in payroll costs. Or, those payroll cuts might simply go straight to those at the the top of the company - those poor souls who really need the help.

I am surprised at how ignorant most retail people are about their products. They used to pay enough to keep good employees but not so much any more.

I was recently purchasing a camcorder. I wanted to touch it in person so I used B&M stores. The person at Frys had no business selling anything. I actually asked him if there was someone in the department that knew about the cameras. He brought a woman over that barely knew more then he did.

I went to Best Buy and that guy answered everyone of my questions and pointed out some things I hadn't thought of. I bought from Best Buy. I was so impressed I wrote to them about my experience.

I don't know what's more rare...someone writing to a company about a positive experience, or a genuinely competent employee at Best Buy.

 

[foghorn67]

wtf was JCPenny thinking in switching to Walmart strategy of no sales?
keep prices low everyday? now you're competing w/Walmart?!

The only reason a majority of people goto your stores is for the sales.
heck, that goes for ALL major dept stores. Else they goto walmart

You are why decent stores go out of business. Unlike Walmart, JCPenny's clothes are heavily discounted.
For example, the same pair of Docker's khaki's I like are 36 bucks everyday at Penny's. It beats Kohl's typical price and their sales price. Same for Van Heusen shirts.

Now, since they hired their previous jack-ass, that no longer applies. They are trying to beat Kohl's and others by imitating them. My incentive to JCP isn't so much any more.

However, I love the layout of the new JCP.

And I agree with OP. No nonsense clusterfucks. Cheap, quality Stafford and JCP dress clothes. Nothing great, but really nice for everyday work clothes.

They were heading in the right direction, now they cater to bottom feeders that can't remember prices.

 

[sjwaste]

The problem with JCP, and probably the rest of the mid-line dept stores is that I have no idea what they sell and I bet that's a common thing. For instance, I know I can go there for pretty much anything, but is it any good? Or is it just cheap? What are they trying to market to me?

The higher end department stores do a better job of this:

Nordstrom - Top end stuff, no hiding the fact that they will punch me and take my wallet
Bloomingdales - Almost the same
Saks - Nordstrom, but mostly skews older in the men's dept
Lord and Taylor - Old ppl shop here

etc. Now let's compare:

Macy's - Decent stuff at a decent price, but not selling me on fashion or price
JCP - ???
Sears - Tools and electronics, but they apparently sell everything else
Walmart - Cheap Chinese shit, can't lay off the prices
Target - One step above Walmart, no pee on the floors

What I end up doing is the opposite of department store shopping. I'll hit Walmart for essentials, Sears for tools, Brooks Brothers for dress shirts, Nordstrom for suits, etc. Point is, sometimes I want cheap, sometimes I want good quality, and I know who sells those. Everything else is just a question mark in the middle (am I paying more for Walmart quality or getting a deal on Bloomingdale's?)