Edward Lampert Quotes

People are always going to go shopping. A lot of our effort is just: 'How do we make the retail experience a great one?'

If you think you know the consumer better than anyone, then you're in real trouble. So we take a close watch. You spend time in stores.

The challenge of the retail business is the human condition.

I don't like department stores. I had a chain of department stores back in 1994 which was Lewis's and Owen Owen, only for a short time, and I found department stores personally difficult.

I'm lucky that I was in retailing during the time that I call the golden age of retailing.

Retail is my game. I spend every waking hour thinking about it. I started in the industry at the age of 18 after trying various other things that were mind-numbingly boring to me.

What I've come to find out is it doesn't matter if you're selling a $10,000 gown or toilet paper: The everyday sort of humdrum of customer service and retail is the same.

I have never been to IKEA, no.

Our local department store had two Santas - one for regular kids and one for kids who wanted ten toys or less.

I remember when Circuit City was around, I never understood why people would shop there. I always thought Best Buy had a better selection and cheaper prices.

While I do occasionally order items on the Internet, it's hard to teach an old shopper new tricks. I'm convinced that the catalogue will eventually disappear, but not until the last baby boomers have kicked off their smelly Nikes and been buried in mulch.

I love to go shopping at Target. They have so much stuff there, you can buy almost anything, it's really amazing.

I am a connoisseur of products. I check out everything, I try everything.

No one in my family had a retail or marketing background. They were professionals. They didn't understand just what I was doing by going into retailing. After I started, though, it got into my blood. I knew this was what I wanted.

Apple has hundreds of stores around the world that are beautiful, and they have a distribution system and a staff of 40 or 50 people that will help you.

People don't buy for logical reasons. They buy for emotional reasons.

Working in a store and being a shop assistant, if you don't know what to do and you like fashion, I think it's a great way of getting into the business because you do windows, cleaning, and everything. That was my school for two years, working in a shop, and that's how I met people in magazines and designers.

But in another, I think a woman's going to go into a shop to find a coat or a jacket and I just don't think she's not going to go into a shop because of a bad review she probably didn't even read.

I think we are living in a time where the consumer has lots of choices, whether it's coffee, newspapers or whatever it is. And there is parity in the market place, and as a result of that, the consumer is beginning to make decisions, not just on what things cost and the convenience of it.

I got into retailing because I wanted a real job.

Just the other day, my assistant was on the line with Calvin Klein. Golly, I usually shop at Sears.

I did work at a mall in college - I think retail/customer service is just one of the most hideous jobs in the world. So I always try to be extra nice when I go into a store. But malls are part of our culture, if you watched any teen comedy in the '80s. it's clear that malls are where we live!

In fashion, we don't often know the prices. We don't have time to go into the stores.

I didn't want to be a retailer. I hated to wait on people.

I loved the fact that if you put goods on the floor, you could watch them sell.