sell a lifestyle, http://jobs.a-i-m.net/index.php?p=blogs/viewstory/140496 - http://jobs.a-i-m.net/index.php?p=blogs/viewstory/140496
I worked in retail as a manager for over a decade. I spent time at Costco, Walmart and Target along with my current employer who I will leave out of this answer for privacy sake.
As to your question: Yes, all retailers sell lifestyle. It is not even "to a certain extent". It is: "Absolutely, in every sense the cornerstone of how they conduct their business." There is nothing "somewhat" about it. From the moment you walk in the door to when you sitting on your couch at night, http://www.cocktaildressie.com - long cocktail dresses , retailers are selling you a concept of a lifestyle they want you to buy in to.
Most people (save for the wealthy. . . more on that later) are price driven, and given that each retailer within a given class usually has about the same prices as its competitors, secondary things like service, atmosphere and "perception" play a big part. Kmart, Walmart, Meijer (Midwest) and on the edge, straddling the next level up is Target. From there on up you have Kohls, JCPenny, and Sears. Strattling the next level you have Dillard and a few regionals like Elder Beerman. Slightly above them is Macy and above them you have Sak Nordstrom, Neiman Marcus and Bloomingdale />
Given each "level", different retailers market based upon who their clientele is and who they hope to be. When discussing Walmart and Kmart, they are selling the "you smart, you save money, you care about every penny" concept and constantly push that fact in your face. They don push "style" (though, they try to make it look like their smart shoppers aren sacrificing style) because most of their customers (though, not all) are more worried about day-to-day expenses than the latest bag from Kate Spade or the hottest new Jimmy Choo />
If you move up a few notches to Kohl and JCP, you still have customers that are predominantly value driven, but still want to look fashion forward. Given that Kohl and JCP have about the same exact sales and prices, it all comes down to image and service. What designers have products there and how good is the service? So the companies can charge a bit more for products than--say--Target, and still need to provide better service than Walmart but cannot give you the one-on-one level of attention that you get at places like Bloomingdales because that would demand higher labor costs, higher prices which put them out of the value-conscious-style-driven shopper range.
And speaking of Bloomingdale if you shop there, you get called by their employees, http://gzczc.uueasy.com/read.php?tid=1428733 - http://gzczc.uueasy.com/read.php?tid=1428733 . They don advertise. Their employees build a clientele list and call them periodically to tell them about upcoming events. Once in the store, you get personal, one-on-one attention (which is about the same level of attention you get at the other high-end stores). In these cases, even the wealthy want a good price, but being on the cutting edge of style and feeling like you gotten the hottest new thing generally trumps the actual value of the product.
When you take into consideration warehouses like Sam Club, Costco or BJ (regional to New England and the Midwest), their core audience that they say they are targeting is "small businesses" but don buy that line of bull. While small businesses are a core business (and I don know how many exactly), the majority of shoppers are people like you and me. The reason we shop there is because--well--warehouses are generally fun. The service is usually a lot better than places like Walmart or even Target, but the selections are always limited (they negotiate with--say--P to get gigantic bottles of Tide, on massive pallets, so Tide and a few others might be the only detergent they carry, just not enough room for bulking EVERY brand). Their "bread and butter" is the membership fees and services like the deli, bakery and peripherals like travel and auto discounts. A typical Costco might have something like 35,000 members, 30k of whom are "standard" customers, who cover every gambit from middle class to wealthy, but their goal is usually the same: service and value (I can tell you how many Centurion cards I saw when I was a marketing manager at Costco--and they were damned penny-pinchers to boot, http://www.formalgownsuk.com - formal dresses with sleeves !). I don know BJ but I do know Sam and Costco. Sam is slighly more Walmartish in its value-driven approach, whereas Costco is a bit more service and quality driven (which is why Costco is one of three retailers [Nordstrom, Costco and Kohl that will guarantee practically every product, for life; even if you return the product fifty years later, they take it back). Most people, however, are just gluttons and shop at warehouses because they think they are getting great value (Just like small businesses!), but end up wasting the gains they make by buying in bulk when they throw the spoiled and expired goods in the trash because they couldn consume them in time (the danger of buying in bulk!).
When you sit back and watch how each retailer markets themselves, you see that they are not only targeting a pre-determined audience, you also see that they try to give that audience (clientele, customer, etc.) a positive view of themselves. Whether that customer wants to be seen as smart and economical, a savvy shopaholic or a cutting edge trend setter, the retailer will constantly seek to market that desire back to them to keep them coming back for more.
First Edit: I left out warehouses. Post above was edited to include those concepts.
Second Edit: The second part of your question asks about online retailers, http://blog.arvixe.com/how-to-find-if-an-extension-exists-in-the-php-configuration-through-terminal/ - http://blog.arvixe.com/how-to-find-if-an-extension-exists-in-the-php-configuration-through-terminal/ . I think the answer is yes to both parts (video demonstrations and customer blogs).
First off, you can already see the "blogish" opportunities with most of the online retailers (Amazon, Ebay, Overstock, Walmart, Target, JCP, http://www.ballgownsoutlet.com/ - wedding ball gowns , Kohl and Target) who all provide an opportunity for publicly viewable feedback on all products along with a "five star" scale to rate the product. I, myself, sometimes doubt the veracity of the reviews (that debate for another time), but they are there for all the world to see.
Second off, while videos of products aren always necessary, they are provided on all major products where a demo may be required to fully understand the product. You may not need a video demo of a pair of Isotoner gloves, but it is certainly applicable for the Kindle eReader sold through Amazon (which has several videos demonstrating the product, IIRC).
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