IS Johnson’s past experience helping or hurting him as he tries to

achieving his goal of making J.C.Penney “Americas favourite store”

Johnsons’s Past experience Changes bought in by past experience

VP Merchandizing Senior VP Retail Operations New Logo & Store Design New Product Product
Spokesperson Offerings Experts

New Sales New Pricing No Sale

His decisions so far are Structure Strategy Clearance
hurting –
$163 Million loss
19% drop in sales
28% in e-commerce
• New Logo & Spokesperson – With his past retail experience in Target, Johnson was determined to reposition
J.C.Penney to which he came up with the idea of creating a new logo and announcing Ellen DeGeneres as
the new brand spokesperson.
• Impact – J.C.Penney logo was changes 3 times in 3 years which created a negative image among the customers.
• Strong backlash from conservative Christian group One Million Moms which created a problem for the brand image
• Store Design – His experience at Apple made Johnson believe that superior customer experience is what
makes customer visit retail stores and thus added complimentary services like gift wrapping and other
promotional events.
• Impact – J.C.Penney logo was changes 3 times in 3 years which created a negative image among the customers.
• New Product Offerings – His Merchandizing experience at Target helped him to redesign JCPs product
offerings and built new supplier relations with brands like Martha Stewart & designers like Nanette Lepore. A
similar strategy used at Target.
• Impact – Focused towards attracting youth but has no major impact because of tough competition from global brands like H&M and
Zara. Also old fashioned customers loyal to J.C.Penney felt ignored and moved out.

• Product Experts – His “Genius Bars” concept at Apple was the most innovative retail concept and he tried to
bring the same at J.C.Penney.
• Impact – The product characteristics are completely different at Apple and JCP. Most of the customers did not see a need for product
expert as fashion needs no forward guidance. It is the choice of customer based on his/her tastes, preferences and comfort.

• New Sales Structure – Inspired from Apple, Johnson felt no need for sales commissions
• Impact – In Fashion where both Pull and Push strategy play an important role, eliminating sales commissions reduced the motivation
among the employees and felt that they are being destroyed.
• New Pricing Strategy – Drawing inspiration from James Cash Penney, Johnson decided to move to everyday
fair prices and introduced “Fair and Square” pricing plan.
• Impact – for the first three months 67% of the products purchased are at fair and square prices but then came the downfall as
customers did not see any promotional activities they doubted if JCP provided good value for money and eventually in a survey only
16% of the customers felt JCP has best buy prices which plummeted the sales to record lows.

• No use of “Sale” / “Clearance” – J.C. Penney avoided using the words “sale” and “clearance” in its messaging
of new program to customers
• Impact – Customers who are deeply blinded by discounts, sales and clearances did not see the discounts that JCP once provided and
moved to other alternatives.