2011 Wireless Summit

OK, OK, so for weeks now, the bloodthirsty business media have been reporting on Best Buy's woes (marked recently by the resignation of CEO Brian Dunn), and our blog has been no exception.

The commonly accused drain on Best Buy's business has been "showrooming," a phenomenon by which online retailers (Amazon especially) capitalize on physical stores and mobile price-check apps to poach sales in real-time.

Wireless retailers are no strangers to the Gen Y demographic, the latter are among the most active mobile device users and also make up the majority of said retailers' in-store workforce.

We've previously blogged about selling to young people and at last year's Wireless Summit, Kurt Reinhart spoke about "Recruiting and Retaining Gen Y."

In a move analysts are calling inspired by Apple, online retail giant Amazon is opening a physical store in its hometown of Seattle very soon, reported Alistair Barr of Reuters (Feb. 6).

How to turn a physical space into a public place that people would love to come back to on regular basis -- a concept also known as the "Third Place"?

What is needed, first and foremost, is a definition of a big idea. A big picture. Sometimes it is a story of a brand; sometimes a clear function of that space; sometimes even just a simple overarching idea. 

A few months ago, I sat down and interviewed Mark Butler and Tony Saraceni, the president and vice president of AT&T Product Center, one of our RQ4 clients based in Long Island, N.Y.

We had a good conversation about lessons they've learned in running their wireless retail business, not to mention the 20-plus years they've worked in retail.