Do you have a retail store?  I did my time in retail in the late 80's—2 years at JC Penny's as a sales associate, and 3 years at Highland Super Stores in computer sales and sales management. Other than the advent of the Internet as a choice to purchase (bricks or clicks) not much has fundamentally changed the way the customer's buying experience occurs in a retail store.  

• People drive to store.
• They look for a product.
• They may interact with some trained individual who possess a special skill to help match customer to the product.
• They decide if they like the value of the product/service and experience.
• They purchase product.
• They leave.
• They go home and use product.

A key metric in retail is to compare the sales at the store from one period to a similar period in the past.  This is referred to as Same Store Sales, or Comparable Store Sales, Comps for short. Recent reports show that Comps are lower across the board. A trip to your local mall on a Tuesday afternoon should run shivers through your spine if you have an invested interest in people walking into one of those stores. The stores are empty.

Wal-Mar, the world's largest retailer, said January sales at its stores open at least a year rose just 0.5% versus its own forecast for a 2% increase for the month. Thomson Financial, which compares monthly results at 42 of the nation's largest retail chains based on analysts' estimates, on Friday revised its final January same-store sales increase to 0.4%, well below forecasts for a 1% increase

Where did the customers go?  What can we do to win them back?  Some recent research is giving us insight into why sales are falling.