Good morning, sales associates! As you know, I just got back from meeting with our CEO and top execs at our flagship store in New York. Now, as your store manager, I don’t have to tell you these are tough times for those of us in retail.

Neiman Marcus came out of bankruptcy. Penney’s and Sears are barely hanging on.

Why this sad state of affairs?

I’ll tell you. It has nothing to do with people buying more stuff online, too many ugly, soulless malls hawking unexciting, me-too merchandise, or a new generation forsaking material goods and shifting their spending toward restaurants and entertainment. The reason these stores are going out of business is because they didn’t make a profit.

So because some of you work in cosmetics, I’ll explain what a profit is and how we make one. Continue reading →