The NRF Annual Conference

By Bob Amster

The NRF Annual Conference was under attended this year. If you were to look around on Tuesday by midday, you would have thought that the conference should have been 1 and half days long. And that is sad because I believe that the trade needs trade shows.

There were three new merchandise allocation packages being shown. There was also significant emphasis on business intelligence software (B.I.), which apparently many retailers have not embraced or they might have eschewed the disasters that has befallen them. The quality of the traffic – I am told by a number of exhibitors – was better in that there were more true buyers looking seriously for solutions than there were window shoppers looking for an excuse to escape the gloomy environment of their corporate headquarters.

There was a rise in Expo Hall passes sold, which may hint that unless the speakers have something revealing and exciting to share, most people would rather look at the toy-like software and hardware solutions. At least with those you can push buttons, see colorful demos and be momentarily bewildered buy some glitzy ‘stuff.’ The size of the single-company delegations to the conference was smaller due to retrenching.

I am also told that, conversely, 40 out of 50 member CIOs attended the CIO Council meeting at the conference which to me, means that CIOs are in search of ideas on how to cope and of solutions from each other, or that misery loves company. The saddest thing is that, for many of these individuals, budgets are frozen, and new projects are on hold. This is a very boring existence for people who predominantly like to create, like a challenge, and like to contribute to the wellbeing of the business. But, it’s better than being unemployed. Most retail CIOs to whom we spoke are in a holding pattern.

he show is moving to Washington D.C. in 2010. Some speculate that the NRF is becoming more of a lobby for the industry than a fraternity within the industry and, therefore, it is important to show in D.C. If that is true, I suspect that attendance will drop further until there is no Annual Conference but just a political lobby. Shame…