零售商在2019年又活过来了

越来越多的已经破产或失败的零售商似乎在去年起死回生，其中一些深受喜爱的品牌更是以一种更具亲和力的形象回归生之国度。

Le Tote最近从HBC手中购买了举步维艰的Lord & Taylor，并于假日季在纽约市推出了这家百货店连锁品牌的快闪店。这是Lord & Taylor于2019年初闭店之后在曼哈顿的首次亮相。2019年初申请破产的儿童服饰品牌Gymboree（两年内的第二次破产）将以商店的形式继续存活于200 Children’s Place店面之中。已经完成店面清算的Barneys New York将出现在萨克斯第五大道（Saks Fifth Avenue）的多家店面中，包括萨克斯第五大道位于曼哈顿旗舰店的第五层楼。

上述案例与最近FAO Schwarz玩具店和玩具反斗城的小范围回归告诉人们，尽管遭遇了企业的管理不善以及令人窒息的债务危机，但它们依然拥有顽强的生命力。因此，虽然所谓的零售寒冬已经让多个连锁品牌凋零，但很多起死回生的品牌得到了消费者的热烈欢迎。

以Lord & Taylor为例，HBC在该品牌的电子商务化方面可谓是异常缓慢：抛开其他失策问题不谈，公司在2018年才设立一个适用于移动设备的网站。Le Tote的首席执行官拉克什·唐顿对《财富》杂志说：“我们将传统销售方式与Le Tote将要采纳的科技进行了结合。”他在谈论这家有着193历史的零售商时说：“它是一个殿堂级的品牌，其价值是不可估量的。”同时，公司经验丰富的管理团队正在努力寻找提取这种价值的方法。（财富中文网）

本文另一版本登载于《财富》杂志2020年1月刊，标题为《起死回生》。

译者：冯丰

审校：夏林

A growing number of bankrupt or failed retailers seem to be discovering an afterlife last year—with some beloved brands returning to the land of the living in notably snugger incarnations.

Le Tote, which recently bought the ¬struggling Lord & Taylor from HBC, opened a pop-up shop for the department store chain in New York City for the holidays, its first Manhattan presence since the store closed in early 2019. Kids’ apparel brand Gymboree, which filed for bankruptcy in early 2019 for the second time in two years, will live on in the form of shops within 200 Children’s Place stores. And Barneys New York, once it is done liquidating its stores, will have a presence at a number of Saks Fifth Avenue stores, including the fifth floor of the chain’s Manhattan flagship.

These cases, along with the recent small-scale comebacks of FAO Schwarz and Toys “R” Us, all show how much life there still is in many storied retail brands, corporate mismanagement and choking debt loads aside. So while the so-called retail apocalypse has claimed a number of chains, many are being welcomed back with open arms by consumers.

In the case of Lord & Taylor, HBC had been very late in equipping it for e-commerce: It only got around to having a mobile-device-friendly site in 2018, among other missteps. “We are combining tradition with the technology that Le Tote is bringing to the table,” Le Tote chief executive Rakesh Tondon tells Fortune. “It’s an iconic brand,” he says of the 193-year-old retailer. “There’s a lot of value in that.” And savvier management teams are figuring out how to extract such value.

A version of this article appears in the January 2020 issue of Fortune with the headline “Die Another Day.”