Why paper catalogs still matter

The pages of the 1942 Sears Christmas catalog held much that might seem quaintly old-fashioned today.

The department store retailer’s easy payment plan, which could be laid out in a simple grid, has been replaced by sophisticated retail credit cards that offer various rewards and complex terms. The wooden toy tanks and metal fire trucks featured as Christmas toys are far more likely to be made of plastic and make electronic noise today. With World War II raging in Europe and the Pacific, the catalog advertised war bonds and products that could be sent to soldiers and even devoted pages to imploring readers to save spare nails for the federal government.

The mere existence of a printed Sears catalog would be just as alien to today’s consumers. The retailer axed the paper catalog in the 1990s and Sears is hardly alone. But the printed catalog isn’t gone. In fact by some measures, in some sectors of retail, it’s thriving. Retailers still mail billions of catalogs every year, and tens of millions of consumers still make purchases based, at least in part, on images and copy printed in catalogs that find their way to mailboxes.

Today the paper catalog has become primarily a marketing tool — one of special importance during the holiday season. And for many, it remains an important sales channel. The most sophisticated retailers are continuously working to build a seamless omnichannel operation and experience that uses catalogs, websites and physical stores seamlessly and interchangeably to help customers shop and make purchases.

A quarter century back, generalist catalogs like those of Sears, J.C. Penney and Spiegel could weigh pounds and carry nearly everything a retailer had on offer that year. They also allowed retailers to reach customers no matter where they lived, and customers could order products free of a laborious trip to the store.

Sounds familiar? “What the internet is, is a catalog. It’s an electronic catalog,” Nick Egelanian, president of retail real at estate consulting firm SiteWorks, said in an interview. “In the days when there wasn’t internet, the equivalent of Amazon was the Spiegel catalog or Sears catalog, and they were both four or five inches thick, had stiff physical limits and were very heavy.”
more at:  http://www.retaildive.com/news/why-paper-catalogs-still-matter/506298/

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