The Weaver Street Market Co-operative employee Market Messenger this past week offers more disheartening evidence that some on the WSM corporate office management team would prefer to forget that we are a co-op. It inspired a letter from me to the WSM Merchandising Manager, James Watts, which letter I think is self-explanatory.
I will continue to attempt to stem the tide, with about as
much luck, I dare say, as we are having in the US and the UK avoiding the
consequences of the weather. But where stemming does not work, I will at least
continue to bear witness:
"Dear James,
The front page of the employee ‘Market Messenger’ this past week
has an article headlined “Have you noticed some new things happening with our
Marketing and Merchandising Programs?” The article invites we workers to offer
theories for what is working and what is not. I accept the invitation.
So. Yes, I have noticed. And what is happening is likely not
a very effective use of resources. And most certainly is in contravention of
our purpose as a co-operative.
On the face of it, you seem merely to be announcing changes
in the style of leaflets on offer. But it is more than that.
Your article is peppered with phrases like making offers
‘more exciting to owners,’ ‘what motivates our customers,’ ‘product promotions
that will bring in new shoppers, or motivate extra purchasing from our
established customers.’
James, that is the language of conventional grocery stores,
which employ all sorts of expensive marketing gimmickry to entice punters to
buy goods they likely would not otherwise buy.
That is not the purpose of a co-operative grocery store. And
we shouldn’t be doing it. More than that, we don’t need to.
Co-operatives exist to provide for the common needs of our
owners. That is not merely an idealistic slogan. It is the essence of our
business model.
We have 18,000 local owners. If you want to know what they
want to buy, don’t sit in a remote Hillsborough office scanning impersonal
sales figures, don’t play mind games, don’t experiment, don’t motivate, don’t
entice – just ask them. It’s the co-operative thing to do. And it doesn’t cost
as much.
Old-style marketing and merchandising and the consequent
sales figures may have a place in helping us to determine what our owners want.
But a limited place. However, if we adhere slavishly to the whole expensive and
reactive exercise, treating it as some sort of infallible religion, we risk not
only making ourselves more remote to our owners, but also wasting a lot of
money.
You cite the example of a recent weekend Wellness promotion,
comparing consequent sales with the same weekend last year, noting they were
less, and concluding that ‘this promotion wasn’t enticing enough to bring
customers into the store.’
Leaving aside my point that this sort of approach is
antithetical to the co-operative ethos, it just doesn’t make any kind of
commercial sense. You do not have enough information from sales alone to be
able to make a sensible comparison.
Was there a more interesting basketball game on this year,
which kept people home? Was the weather worse? Has the weather been worse
generally this winter, encouraging folks to look after themselves better, hence
requiring less Wellness this late in the Winter?
You don’t get this control information from sales figures.
You get it from people. And that again is what sets co-operative ownership as a
business model apart from conventional and impersonal marketing gimmickry.
The most important lesson that economists, micro and macro,
have learned in the past forty years is that they are wrong to base their
predictions, comparisons and conclusions on models which treat human beings as
identical rational economic agents. People are people, not economic robots. They
behave irrationally. And no two of them are the same. If you want to know what
they want, ask them. Better still, let them choose.
That is the lesson behind localism, devolution of power and
economic democracy. It is the impetus behind the growth in mutualism and
co-operation. Well, in most other co-operatives aside from ours, where
apparently we still believe that we can best understand our owners and provide
for their common needs by pretending they are merely sales figures.
So. Share you figures. But why not place more emphasis
instead on an intimate and personal owner-driven merchandising effort, rather
than a reactive and remote marketing-driven one?
Why not set up consumer-owner product discussion groups? Why
not encourage all marketing and merchandising staff to spend at least a day a
week behind a counter, talking one-on-one with owners? Why not have an online
forum, to allow owners to talk with each other, and give you regular feedback?
And why not do the asking before you make changes, not after?
I do not believe that relying on a hit-and-miss marketing
effort is any more empirical than employing the co-operative option of simply
asking our owners what they want. I do, however, believe that in terms of all
of the investment required it is more expensive.
I think it only fair to mention that I am placing this
letter on my blog. Along with the caveat that these are my views, and not the
official views of WSM. You made your changes public. I’m making my suggested
alternatives public.
All the best in co-operation,
Geoff"
Posts
