Nordstrom
- This is a preview of the essay.
To view the full text you must login!
Background
Nordstrom had, by the end of 1989, grown to be the leading US specialty retailer of apparel, shoes, and accessories. Founded in 1901 by John W. Nordstrom as a shoe store, the company had always been run by members of the Nordstrom family, who still own nearly have of it. Currently the company is co-managed by brothers Jim and John, and by cousin Bruce, the third generation of Nordstrom managers, who had been at the helm since 1970.
The company operated 59 department stores in 6 states and was planning to open more stores in additional states in the early 1990s. At date, sales were approaching $3 billion and the company was enjoying one of the highest profit margins in its industry, employing 30000 people.
Nordstrom's strongest competitive advantage, since ever, and consequently a major source of its financial success has been its superior customer service. The company's salespeople ("Nordies") were the envy of the industry in terms of their quality and productivity, frequently performing exceptional customer service efforts, such as driving to another store to retrieve a desired out of stock item, or calling up a valued customer to alert him of newly arriving merchandise. Such acts helped the company to build its alluring image, guarantee customer loyalty, and increase sales. The biggest evidence of this success was that Nordstrom's biggest rivals started to emulate their service-oriented strategy...