Supplier mornings go better when the plates are already marked
A buyer chart session is not theatre for the representative. It is a half day to mark cuts before anyone from the brand sits down.
Notes from the floor and the extract
Notes from the extract and the floor
These pieces are written from sittings and from arguments that keep returning: empty facings that look like poor demand, promotions that never reached the gondola, and averages that hide a weak room. They are not a catalogue of briefings. If you want work done, ask the desk.
Pencil on the range list is still a grouping
A printed sheet with arrows and crossings-out is often truer than a tidy file of SKU codes the floor no longer uses.
A markdown that arrives after the facing is already dead
Ticket cuts made on a Friday night do not rescue a line that occupied three facings all week. Timing belongs on the plate.
Like-for-like is a discipline, not a courtesy to the weak room
Averaging three shops into one cheerful number hides the room that is carrying last season’s jackets. Why we draw shops apart.
When the till says bread moved and the bay is empty
A jump in bakery figures is often a hole in the file, not a rush on loaves. How we separate demand from a missing afternoon tab.