The Big Fat Marketing Blog

Business Week ran a good article on the USPS that all should read. Here it is.

If you listen to the rumors, that seems to be the case.

Charming Shoppes, which has owned and operated the Lane Bryant plus-size women’s apparel stores since 2001, is trying to right its ship after Anthony M. Romano was named president/CEO of the multititle cataloger in March.

Romano had been promoted to chief operating officer/acting CEO of Charming Shoppes in October. Prior to that, Romano was Charming Shoppes’ executive vice president of global sourcing and business transformation. And before he joined Charming Shoppes, Romano served as executive vice president/chief supply chain officer for Ann Taylor.

Charming Shoppes had a strong fourth quarter 2010 with net sales up 7%, and ecommerce sales for fiscal 2010 jumped 38%, to $131.4 million. Romano must be channeling some of his inner Charlie Sheen because one of the four areas he stresses for fiscal 2011 is to build a “winning culture.”

Romano said the company will close about 240 unprofitable stores this year, adding that more than half of these stores are at Fashion Bug – which targets women aged 30-50. Fashion Bug has more than 700 specialty stores in 43 states. more

If you’re reading this blog, most likely you want customers to open their wallets and give you money. Lots of it.

But do they do it gleefully? As I experienced recently, customers (excuse me, guests) of Walt Disney World do.

(And before anyone gets their “Pirates of the Caribbean” undies in a twist, I’m not knocking Disney here. I say that because another column I wrote years ago about the marketing at the Disney Resorts resulted in a nasty letter taking me to task for being snarky about the House of Mouse. So excuse any snark, it’s just how I show love. Seriously. Ask my husband and kids.)

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My old high school (and junior high) yearbooks are sitting in a bin in my storage shed, underneath several other bins of junk. So when I saw this ad for Yearbookarchives.com on Facebook, I figured I’d check it out.

The link pointed to Yearbookarchives.com all right. But it had the look and feel of being on Classmates.com. And of course, one click ay yearbookArchives.com brought me directly to a Classmates.com registration page.

And with that, I lost faith in Facebook ads. And I also thought, maybe this was Classmates.com’s revenge on Facebook for stealing away all its business. more

For this year’s summer postage sale, the U.S. Postal Service has jumped on the quick response (QR) code bandwagon.

QR codes are two-dimensional barcodes that enable smartphone users to tap into mailers’ Web sites and get instantaneous information about, and offers from, that company.

During July and August, the USPS will offer 3% postage discounts on standard and first class letters, flats or cards containing the proper barcodes.

This promotion might indeed be something that could give a shot in the arm to mail which has been generally declining for quite some time. more

Crate & Barrel sister company CB2 pulled off a clever email tie-in to Michael Scott’s final day as boss on “The Office” last week, starting with the subject line “farewell to the world’s best boss. you always left us wanting more.”

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