The last time i shopped in JC Penney and left satisfied was when i bought eyeliner that was at a Sephora inside of a JC Penney. To my knowledge their clothes were so kiddish that they seemed to have two little girl sections located in two different parts of the store. Instead I went to Kohl’s, Forever 21, or Charlotte Russe. That is where i shopped. Recently, however, I walked into a JCP and was immediately attracted to the clothes and in my head I though “When did this happen??” Take about taking fashion forward seriously.
The new strategy that JCP is taking seems to be working and if sustained it will keep the company growing. Much of the new strategy has to do with the new executive, Ron Johnson. Ron Johnson is a former executive on the Apple and Target board of directors. What he has done was bring the store back to the original saying “Giving Everyone a Square Deal”. You can see it in everything from the new logo to the clothes that are offered at a price that seems very fair.
If the company continues it can turn the corner and possibly become an industry leader in fashion. I wonder what other Clothings stores can benefit from a little bit of an improvement.
JCP has been in the financial news a lot lately due to the turnaround of Ron Johnson. When Ron Johnson was brought in from Target, he made a lot of promises and created a lot of hype that he would turn the company around. One of his strategy changes was to change pricing to a fixed price and not drown the consumer in coupons. Recently there has been a lot of people saying that the turnaround isn’t going to work, but Ron Johnson should not be judged this quickly. It will be very interesting to see where Ron Johnson and JCP is in a few years.
It is interesting to see how far JCP has come. I remember reading an article that was talking about all of the marketing changes that were going to take effect in the stores. For example, one was that they were going to get rid of all the .99(s) in the price tag. Now they only have exact prices, similar to Apple. I thought that was a brilliant move, people are now going to be attracted to these prices because they seem lower. However, I have not been in a JCP recently so I cannot attest to this that it has made an impact on the buyer, I am only going off of what I have read on the internet. I do applaud JCP for changing the way that they do things, they had to. If they did not make any changes to the current operation of the store then they would have gone under because they were out of date and not listening to what the consumer wants from a desirable shopping experience.
JCP was never really one of the stores that I would even think of shopping in, until I found out that they had a mini section of “Mango” inside. I definitely think that JCP is working on improving the type of clothing they are carrying in the stores, but I also think that they still have a long way to go. Changing the type of clothing that they sell in the store is not going to be enough and they will also have to work on changing consumer’s perception of the store. It is not going to be an easy process, but I do believe that with a new executive Ron Johnson, they are on the right track to becoming a fashion industry leader.
We actually talked about this in a Marketing class I took and the overwhelming consensus was that the fixed pricing would backfire. It’s an interesting idea, but it seems it Ron may be using it in the wrong way because normally fixed pricing is used on high price items, not lower end clothing stores. But, in this economy where people are still struggling to find the money it may be comforting to go to a store that has one easy fixed price, rather than spending hours bargain shopping for the best combination of sales and coupons.
I recently walked through a JCP to get into the many desired stores i know and love and came across a new and improved JCP! As we all know, JCP is one of the few stores that doesn’t have the best fashion forward clothing but seeing that JCP taking a different shift has really helped the store.
Apparently, having new management as greatly impacted their strategy on modernizing the company’s growth by seeing what the customers these days like and changing the many negative aspects that didn’t help them. Not only have the brands and the look changed but also the prices are definitely a bargain. JCP has now giving me more desire to actually go into their clothing section then walking past it to get to other stores. It remarkable to how change has come to such a long-standing company. I’m sure this is only the start to JCP to grow more and more now that they have such a great management behind them.
I absolutely agree with everything said in the article as well as the comments. I have not walked into JCP since I had to take my little brother shopping, but I have heard about the Sephora inside.
I think with new management and a new strategy, JCP might go up in the department store ladder. I doubt it will be on top and competing with Nordstrom or Bloomy’s, but maybe more something like Macy’s.
I am interested in seeing the Financial Reports for this upcoming year at JCPenney and see how successful they actually have been. While their clothes may be more attractive, their marketing campaign has begun to push away their usual demographic of middle-aged to senior citizen shoppers. At a recently family activity JCPenney actually came up in discussion and my grandma, mom, and aunts all agreed that they didn’t like the new marketing and didn’t like the way the store was heading… I found this very interesting. I personally never shop there, but I’m all for Ellen being their spokeswoman!
I think another reason why JCP is doing so well is Ellen DeGeneres. As an openly gay woman with many fans, other designers that may have not been interested in working with JCP now are. Bringing Ellen as the spokesperson was absolutely genius of JCP. What I think will be difficult is actually bringing people into the store for a second time to see how much they’ve changed. Yes, I like Ellen and I think it’s pretty cool that she’s the spokesperson, but will she get me to commute to JCP the same way I would to Nordstrom? Nope. I think it’s very difficult for a company to rebrand itself after the public already has a certain perception of them.
JCP does have a reputation for being quite unfashionable well at least in my eyes. The way the stores are set up they make you just not want to navigate them and i agree that previously i to have had the feeling that the offerings in the store were for a younger or different demographic of people. I have seen the new commercials that hint that JCP is becoming more fashion forward but i am not way tempted to visit any of their locations.