Federated brings its prodigal Macys.com home
As retailers focus more on the importance of brand structures in driving multi-channel strategies, Federated Department Stores Inc. said today it is realigning Macys.com and Bloomingdale`s By Mail to once again operate directly under their namesake store divisions. "We believe there is greater potential in more closely aligning these direct-to-customer channels with the marketing strategies of the department stores," said Terry J. Lundgren, Federated`s president and COO.
Federated had moved Macys.com and the Bloomingdale`s catalog unit outside of their respective branded divisions and into a corporate-serving Federated Direct unit in 1999, following Federated`s acquisition of the Fingerhut Companies, which included several catalog and e-commerce retail operations. Macys.com was intended then to support all of Federated`s e-commerce operations. "When direct-to-customer was a larger part of the business, it made sense to have Macys.com focused on all e-commerce, bringing the brands together," a spokeswoman says. "Today it`s a much different world." Federated sold its Fingerhut assets last summer.
Under the new alignment, Macys.com President Kent Anderson will report to Macy`s West President Michael J. Osborn effective March 1. This will enable Macy`s to exert more direct control over a multi-channel strategy that supports the Macy`s brand, such as better coordinated cross-marketing and cross-merchandising strategies, the spokeswoman says.
Jim Okamura, a retail analyst with J.C. Williams Group in Chicago, says the realignment makes sense, as more retailers are being organized into a brand structure instead of dividing a brand into distinct channels that often don`t coordinate marketing and merchandising. "This is positive for Macys.com," he says. "Many of the barriers to multi-channel integration are internal. In many cases, getting the online management team together with the stores management team was awkward. They weren`t communicating and weren`t aware of the other`s activities."
Okamura adds that the move toward a brand-based multi-channel organizational structure is emerging as a new best practice for the retail industry.
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