Back Seat Marketers

Just took another look at the Consumer Sentiment Index thanks to U of Michigan via the St Louis Fed, and it is still at historically low levels…

The hunt for income dollars are coming in all areas. As we’ve covered, distressing times are when business models are broken [Hint: Amazon quietly gets into private labels [...]

In a product marketing class we took in undergrad, we played a simulation game each week that was supposed to replicate a market with consumers that had shifting preferences over time. All of our teams were given comparative advantages and then had to determine where we fit today in the market, and had to read [...]

The WSJ reports that spending is far off, and the more luxury and discretionary, the less people chose it.

As people hunker down, lose their jobs, see iconic corporations change dramatically, and face a new reality of a more fundamental lifestyle, we’re going to see a shift of importance in creating value. Value in 2007 was [...]

No doubt, these times are increasing the focus on value marketing. What is becoming more obvious is the need to increase the focus on ensuring that a company’s strategy has meaningful purpose beyond the financial statements.
What do I mean by purpose? Umair finally kicked me in the head on this one last week [...]

Even the top tier brands are beginning to feel the US consumer pinch.
To appreciate our situation, consumer sentiment is reaching long time lows (source: St. Louis Fed):

Value marketing isn’t about going for cheap, it is about getting more for less = benefits / price. Wal-Mart forged value merchandising into almost every consumer category they served [...]