A while back I had a go at asking a venerable UK retail institution if they thought I could help at all (well, in a very specific way) with what appeared to be a terminal decline in fortunes. Of course, nothing came of that ask and the company shut its entire estate just afterwards. So we will never know if I would have been of service. Or indeed, if I wasn’t part of the problem.
When famous brands, especially high street ones, appear to trip and look like they’re struggling, most double-down on saving what they can by cutting back.
So the affectionately regarded Marks & Spencer, recognising they may now never really recover the reputation which was held for clothing, have switched out skirts for sandwiches (simplistically. I know the digital side of their operations is a whole other ballgame) in opening 100 new food outlets and closing 25% of the department stores.
Their strategy, shared by the chief executive, said the retailer was “creating a fit for the future store estate.” Sounds a lot like building a parachute while falling to me. With all the risk that implies.
It left me wondering, as I have the latitude to, not being beholden to shareholders (or anyone really), what would happen if M&S stopped thinking about itself as a general retailer and positioning itself as a grocery - or even an f&b - brand?
Food revenue for them was up 10% and profits from it up nearly 20%. Better jumps that jumpers.
Younger members of my family primarily see M&S as a food stop already. Ocado vans are on every street corner. Doesn’t mean they need to pretend to be a new Dean & DeLuca (and certainly not financially!) but shifting positioning from the general to the specific - say considering the store-as-everything to a specific, like a food hall perhaps, with the benefit of showing homewares through the medium of eat-in ‘stages’? Does that sound so odd a strategy?
Perhaps it’s time for some brands to admit it ‘isn’t just any strategy’ they need. It’s an M&S strategy they’re after. One that moves them from Macs & Slippers to Muncher’s & Sipper’s.
And apologies to M&S for appropriating your brand assets here. No harm intended.
