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Nationwide Marketing Group (not to be confused with the Nationwide insurance company) touts itself America’s largest buying and marketing organization. Its 3,500 members operate over 11,000 storefronts across the US and have $15 billion in combined annual sales. Nationwide is so large that it has seven regional divisions. Each of them is led by a retail industry veteran. Nationwide is based in Winston-Salem, North Carolina.
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When you’re selling products and services, the way to make money looks straightforward — Sell the item for more than you paid for it and pocket the difference. That difference, the “margin”, is what you rely on to stay in business.
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Self checkouts, where a customer rings up their own items, bags them, and pays without a cashier, have been implemented in many grocery chains, fast food restaurants, and chain retailers across the country, with NCR Corporation supplying 68 percent of these systems. Should you jump on the self-serve checkout train, too?
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It’s a sad fact that if your business isn’t making more money than it’s spending, at some point you’re going to run out. And in almost all cases, that means you’re out of business.
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It’s here: Taking PayPal in stores.
Okay, technically it’s been here for a while, but the number of stores that can accept PayPal is about to shoot up dramatically with the official beginning of First Data’s (now Fiserv’s) in-store PayPal acceptance.
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The National Association of Retail Buyers & Sellers (NARB) is a non-profit founded in 2009 by two retail industry veterans. Their goal was to create an organization that would help retail professionals share information and best practices with one another so that all members could succeed. One of the benefits of joining NARB is that you’ll get special offers (read: discounts) from vendor sponsors. However, increasing members’ buying power isn’t the sole purpose of this NJ-based organization. It also seeks to develop members’ careers and serve as a resource for many aspects of retail buying and selling, store planning, and product development. Unlike many buying groups or group purchasing organizations, NARB is only open to individuals, not to businesses.
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Royal Buying Group (RBG) was founded in 1995. The group, based in Illinois, is designed to support independent convenience store retailers. RBG negotiates with national vendors to increase members’ buying power and reduce their operating expenses. In addition, this buying group offers such benefits for its members as educational programs and networking events.
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The Home Technology Specialists of America (HTSA) is a group purchasing organization for consumer electronics retailers. A group of consumer electronics retailers founded it in 1996, and, as of September 2016, is the only member-owned cooperative buying group in the consumer electronics space. The group’s purpose has always been to give independent retailers in this field a stronger voice, which it does by increasing their purchasing power, serving as a forum for best practices, and increasing members’ market share.
