As Canada's biggest bookstore-turned-gift-giver's-paradise edges toward privatization, it's evident from a stroll around one of its Toronto stores that the retailer knows some things haven't been working.
Indigo CEO Heather Reisman poses for a portrait at the retailer's new location in Toronto, Thursday, Oct. 26, 2023. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Chris YoungAs Canada’s biggest bookstore-turned-gift-giver’s-paradise edges toward privatization, it's evident from a stroll around one of its Toronto stores that the retailer knows some things haven’t been working.
Some of this work appears to be underway already, but how much further it will go depends on a May shareholder vote to decide whether to accept the offer of $2.50 per share in cash — up from $2.25 in February — from Trilogy Retail Holdings Inc. and Trilogy Investments L.P. What they will find is that "it's a lot of work to make this business profitable," said Grant Packard, an associate professor of marketing at York University. He previously served as Indigo's interim chief marketing officer and vice-president of marketing.
"If they could, they would spend all day there because it's the equivalent to them of going on a vacation or going to see a movie," said Packard in describing the target customer. "Sauces and that sort of thing, they can go bad and then it begins to be not the quality image that I believe Indigo was going for," said McNeish. "They were never meant to be a discount bookstore."
Since then, an unspecified number of staff were laid off in January and Reisman has said Indigo reinvested in books and has been working to "rightsize and rightshape" its general merchandise in an apparent admission there was a mismatch between customer expectations and what the retailer was offering.
An April letter Reisman sent to customers teased that the company would also bring back its digital inventory search kiosks, program more events, add seating to more stores and find café partners to fill spaces in Indigo shops left vacant by Starbucks. The trick, Packard said, will be deciding on the right number of stores, how to utilize them and how to invest in its online channels in a way that delivers the company to stability.
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