J.C. Penney gets rid of hundreds of sales

[Omaha Steve]

http://apnews.excite.com/article/20120125/D9SG8IA80.html

By ANNE D'INNOCENZIO

NEW YORK (AP) - J.C. Penney is permanently marking down all of its merchandise by at least 40 percent so shoppers no longer have to wait for sales to get bargains.

Penney said Wednesday that it is getting rid of the hundreds of sales it offers each year in favor of a simpler approach to pricing. Starting on Feb. 1, the retailer is rolling out an "Every Day" pricing strategy with much fewer sales throughout the year.

The plan, the first major move by Apple executive Ron Johnson since he became Penney's CEO in November, is different from Wal-Mart's iconic everyday low pricing. Unlike Wal-Mart, Penney's goal isn't to undercut competitors, but rather to offer customers more predictable pricing.

"Pricing is actually a pretty simple and straightforward thing," Johnson told the Associated Press during an interview ahead of the announcement at the company's Plano, Tex. headquarters. "Customers will not pay literally a penny more than the true value of the product."

FULL story at link.

[pacalo]

1. Those are big changes. I wonder if he plans to eliminate the hair salons & the visual merchandising

groups, too.

[itsrobert]

2. I guess they are going away from copying the KOHLS model

Kohls model, jack up all the prices and then put signs up RED TAG sale, Clearance Sale, 40%, 50%, 60% ETC. It fools many customers into thinking they are getting a awesome deal. "Look I got this sweater for 40 percent off, It only cost me $49.95" Same sweater at Target sells for $43.

[global1]

3. You Don't Get Nuthin For Nuthin.......

You can bet your boots that this strategy isn't designed to help the consumer. This is another brainchild marketing gimmick thought up by MBA's (and I have one so don't flame me) made to look attractive to consumers - but in the end will somehow be able to reach into the back pockets of you and I and get at our money - faster and easier. I'm skeptical and suspicious!!!!!!!

Might it be a desperation move? Is J.C.'s in trouble? How did they do over the holidays? How will the other retailers that J.C.'s competes with react?

Let's see how long this strategy lasts.

What I saw being applied before the holidays at many retailers is that the merchandise was priced higher to begin with so that when they offered the holiday sales of 40 and 50% off they still made out better than they did in past years.

It never ceases to amaze me how they keep coming up with quasi-deceptive ways to take our money.

I guess you can call me cynical.

[customerserviceguy]

8. The business model of having everything always on some sort of ever-changing sale is obsolete

Just over seven years ago, I had a part time job at Sears climbing up a ladder in the wee hours of the morning to replace a 40% off sign with a 50% off sign, then climb back up the ladder a few days later to reverse them again. Between all the expense of the printing of the signs, and the BS ad circulars, and yes, even my wages for carrying on this charade, I figured that if they did away with the whole damned mess, they could sell their crap for 60% off full bore rip all of the time.

Maybe Penney's finally got smart enough to figure that out, and if it makes them a few more bucks to not piss away tons of paper and ink destined for landfills to play a silly-ass game with their customers, then they deserve it.

[dipsydoodle]

18. Spittin' , whistlin' and skippin' are free

but not much not much else in this world.

[Sherman A1]

20. Macy's is already making some moves to react

They have or are considering filing a lawsuit against Martha Stewart to prevent her from doing things with JCP and apparently they sent a letter to their vendors, one would think it about pricing.

Stores such as JCP have been suffering well before the great recession. Times are a changin & the net is just part of those changes. Their stores are tired looking, the baby boomers really has enough "stuff" and the next generation(s), while still shopping have far more choices (and possibly less money - there is that 30 years of stagnate wages with which to contend).

I have been in retail for almost 40 years and I too am cynical, but I do get what's going on, some changes have to be made.

[femmocrat]

4. I only go in there occasionally to shop at Sephora.

"Customers will not pay literally a penny more than the true value of the product." <--- Then how do they make a profit???

There are no salespeople on the floor to help customers and then you have to stand in a long line to pay at a distant register station. No thanks! Life's too short for that much inconvenience.

[WCGreen]

6. The whole idea of a department store was to comine the personal touch

with the one stop sales floor.

If there are no sales people on the floor, fuck it, go to COSTCO or BJ's or Sam's

[JI7]

10. this happens at Macys also , but i think they tell their employees not to stand at the register

i wonder if it hurts their sales. i have been to some of these stores and walked all through looking for someone who can ring up my sales. i have seen the same with others.

[WCGreen]

5. If everything is always on sale then nothing is ever on sale...

[virgogal]

7. I've seen their sales ads at least six times tonight. Driving me nuts.

[FiveGoodMen]

29. Yeah, it's mighty obnoxious.

[TygrBright]

9. If true, amazing. Finally someone gets it. n/t

[mysuzuki2]

11. JC Penney is still around?

Who knew?

[Lydia Leftcoast]

12. I buy socks and underwear from them

[RC]

13. I do also.

Gold toe socks. Lasts forever. Briefs that have to be 10 year old. And the still quite serviceable. No holes. Penney brand have outlasted any other brand I have bought.
I like their shirts because they have an actual size on the label. None of this small, medium or large BS. Compared to what?

[glinda]

14. Bought some nice PJs for my dad there for Christmas.

[Kurmudgeon]

16. Good clothes at Penneys, a cut above the crap you get at Wally World and the others.

[Xithras]

23. It's about the only place I buy clothes.

JCP is one of the few major chains that still has reasonable quality control checks on incoming merchandise, especially clothing. You'll pay a little more, but you get more durable clothing that holds it color longer, resists wear longer, etc. I've bought shirts from Kohls and Sears that started losing their seams and fading after the first washing...and don't get me started on the low quality crap that Target and Walmart foists on the public. That's never happened to me with JC Penney clothing...I have some JCP button downs that I've owned for nearly a decade, and that have been washed countless times, and they're still in nearly new condition.

I'm glad to hear about this change because "sale surfing" is one of the more annoying apects of shopping there...they're horribly overpriced when not running a sale, but the prices are pretty good when the sales are going. Implementing the sales pricing every day makes sense.

I just hope that this profit push doesn't include cutting the quality of their merchandise. I can buy Target quality clothes at Target...everyone I know who shops there does so because JCP sells better products. If they sacrifice that, there won't be much point in shopping there at all!

[JNelson6563]

27. That's so different from my experience!

The Penney's here (at the mall) is wretched. They don't have a very big selection but they have millions of each thing they carry. All crammed tightly onto racks that are too small, making the clothes un-shoppable. Yet the few times I have persevered and actually got a couple things out of the racks to look at, really thin fabric, crooked seams, cheap crap.

Walking through that store I never see anything of real quality and it screams "SWEATSHOP!" to me the way the clothes are. Oh and I remember when they actually had a not too bad selection of purses. The last several years all I see is over priced gigantic vinyl handbags. Ugh.

And if you happen to be smaller than the average size good luck finding anything smaller than an 8 (and I don't mean the actual size 8, I mean the "new" sizing where today's 8 is yesteryear's 12).

I find way better stuff and a much bigger selection at the Goodwill and on E-bay, frankly.

Julie

[lynne]

15. I shop almost exclusively at Penny's -

- and they have a different sale about every other week. Seems like I'm always getting a flyer from them in the mail. Glad to see them make this change - will probably save them big bucks just with the elimination of mailing sales notices!

[RamblingRose]

17. Didn't Sears try this about 15 years ago?? n/t

[hamsterjill]

19. Good move, but their prices won't change.

I shop at Penney's quite a bit, and if you have ever looked at their sales receipt, well, it can get very confusing as to what the real price you pay for an item. It's not rocket science, of course, but takes a minute to review. I think this is simply a move by the new management to simplify things like that. The bottom line of what is paid for something won't be a better deal for the consumer.

[lunatica]

21. It's nothing more than a marketing ploy

I used to work in retail. Their 'specials' with all the glossy signage is just their price. They aren't on sale. Sale is when you look at the price tags and you see the original price marked through with a red pen and a lower price written in with the same red pen (or blue or whatever). Sales are when clothes or items are literally marked down.

[obamanut2012]

22. Sears tried this

And it destroyed Sears,

Bad idea.

[slackmaster]

26. No more "There's a sale at Penny's!" moments

[sarcasmo]

28. This tells me that the mark up was way over 40%.

[tawadi]

30. How the headline should read:

"J.C. Penney gets rid of hundreds of sales associates.."

The rest of it: http://abcnews.go.com/Business/story?id=88710&page=1

Guess they think they can compete with Walmart now?