What Does ‘Culling The Herd’ in Retail Sales Mean? | Retail Today With Bob Phibbs, the Retail Doctor - Flash Briefing

Today is all about culling the herd. That's right, C-U-L-L-I-N-G. The goal is to get rid of the merchandise that isn't selling. Get rid of the dogs, get rid of the one-offs. Go through and make sure that you use this time in the soft months of January and February, to really get rid of that lower 20% that you shouldn't be in. To get rid of those little bits and pieces of merchandise that you thought would be wonderful and then clear it out. Make it at such a low price that your clearance sale only lasts about two weeks at the most. I encourage you to read my blog about how a new broom sweeps clean and that is http://bit.ly/clearancebob, and you'll be able to download the 10 types of merchandise to put on clearance. The main thing to remember though is, use this time to become lean on inventory because it's going to be a while until shoppers are going to be running back in buying more merch.

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