Virtually any consumer understands the difference between a good and bad retail experience. What they likely haven’t thought about is how much goes on behind the scenes to deliver a seamless retail experience, such as managing inventory and suppliers, hiring and training retail teams, and establishing effective financial and customer service and support processes. Retail management encompasses all of those processes and more. In a highly competitive marketplace, in which customer expectations continue to escalate and shoppers can quickly and easily switch to a competitor, mastering retail management is essential for business success.

What Is Retail Management?

Retail management refers to the activities involved in the oversight of a retail establishment’s daily operations, such as inventory management, customer service, staff supervision, and working with key partners, including suppliers and third-party logistics companies. Suffice it to say, those tasks have grown exponentially more complex over the years as ecommerce has taken hold and customers shop via multiple online and offline channels. All told, total U.S. retail sales in 2024 is forecast to land between $5.23 trillion and $5.28 trillion, marking a 2.5% to 3.5% increase over 2023, according to the National Retail Federation (NRF) . Online and other non-store sales are expected to account for approximately 28% of total sales—a nearly 9% increase year over year. NRF attributes much of ecommerce’s growth to multichannel sales.

Key Takeaways

  • Retail management drives daily operations while pursuing long-term business growth.
  • Activities include inventory management, customer service, store and product presentation, financial management, and human resources.
  • Effective retail management is indispensable to business performance.
  • To succeed, retail managers should exhibit a blend of people, process, and technology management skills and demonstrate mastery of best practices.

Retail Management Explained

At its core, retail management encompasses all of the processes required to run, maintain, and grow a retail business. At the highest level, this begins with developing and operationalizing a retail management strategy that aligns with the company’s overarching mission and goals. It then cascades into a multitude of tasks and functions from the most basic, such as making sure that a brick-and-mortar store is clean and organized, to the more complex, such as analyzing customer demand and transactions to optimize inventory and supplier management.

Effective retail management is critical to business success not only in terms of profitability and growth, but it’s also one of the biggest drivers of customer retention, loyalty, advocacy, and value. That means that good retail management practices, as they relate to the customer experience, are an existential necessity for this dynamic sector, in which it’s simpler than ever for customers to shift their business to a competitor.

Much like the job of a general contractor who is responsible for every aspect of a construction project—managing builders, electricians, plumbers, and painters, for example—coordinating all tasks involved in effective retail management is no small feat. At a minimum, activities include overseeing inventory, human resources, sales, order fulfillment, store operations and layouts, warehouse operations, supplier relations, customer service and support, and finance and accounting. But, essentially, anything that has an impact on a retailer’s ability to get customers into a store (virtually or in person) and to meet their expectations falls under the purview of retail management. That might cover a broad range of responsibilities: setting the lighting or temperature in a store, handling customer complaints and questions, developing the best pricing strategies for a particular location, keeping ecommerce storefronts functional and up to date, preventing shoplifting and fraud, coordinating logistics and storage of merchandise, and supervising retail staff.

Why Is Retail Management Important?

The retail environment has never been more rivalrous, with online marketplaces, social commerce channels, established retail chains, and pop-up shops clamoring for shoppers’ attention and dollars. And at this point in the digital era, customer demand for fast, easy, and seamless shopping experiences can’t be overstated. Whether they’re in the market for a luxury vehicle or the lowest-priced toilet paper, shoppers have little tolerance for friction in the retail experience.

There are a number of ways in which strong retail management benefits a retail business—and these apply to retailers of all sizes, from a startup ecommerce site to a global, multichannel big-box store.

  • Customer satisfaction: The more effective a company’s retail management processes are, the more likely it will have enough products in stock to meet customer demand, its store layout and/or website will be easy to navigate, its pricing and promotions will be effective, and its staff will provide better service. That all adds up to happier customers who buy more, are more loyal, and can serve as ambassadors for the brand.
  • Employee motivation and morale: Part of retail management is taking care of the employees who work in stores and behind the scenes. When a retailer invests in and looks after its workers—fully equipping them for their roles, investing in their well-being, and rewarding them for performance—it pays off in satisfied employees who strive to do their best.
  • Process efficiency: There are far too many processes involved in retail management for them to be conducted manually or in an ad hoc manner. When companies invest in retail management processes and technologies, they can often automate many of these activities, such as inventory management, order processing, fulfillment, and invoicing, which saves time and minimizes errors.
  • Heightened productivity: Investing in more efficient systems for managing retail management processes frees up retail employees to accomplish more. What’s more, when they’re not manually tallying inventory or fulfilling orders, they have more time for higher-level tasks that humans are best suited for, such as proactive customer service, visual merchandising, or trend analysis.
  • Increased alignment between strategy and operations: A retailer’s leadership team may have the best strategy, but without good retail management, that mission is little more than words on a page. Retail management operationalizes the company mission and brings the strategy to life.
  • Business growth: Happier customers may buy more from a retailer, but that’s only one way in which robust retail management can benefit the business. The more a retailer can streamline its retail management, the more responsive it can be to shifting customer or marketplace trends. In addition, that increased efficiency described earlier will show up as lower costs of operations—savings that can be reinvested back into the business.

How Does Retail Management Work?

Whereas retail management once revolved around managing a single physical store, today it often includes numerous locations around the country or globe, online storefronts, or a combination of these factors. But no matter what the channel may be, success in retail management requires the skillful balance of meeting business performance objectives, supervising employees, and ensuring a solid shopping experience for customers. Some specific areas of oversight include:

  • Day-to-day store operations, including staff scheduling, customer support, payroll and finances, sales and promotions.
  • Staff management, including hiring, firing, training, and performance management.
  • Customer experience management, including assisting customers, handling complaints, and arranging products and displays.
  • Performance monitoring, including tracking sales metrics, analyzing customer behavior, measuring employee productivity, and evaluating store performance against business goals.
  • Inventory management, including stock level optimization, supplier relationships, order fulfillment, and loss prevention.

What Operations Are Involved in Retail Management?

Retail store management sits at the intersection of people, process, and technology, which converge to control costs, increase operational efficiency, meet demand, motivate staff, and deliver exceptional customer experiences. Each company may have its own particular approach to retail management strategy and systems, but the following functions are most likely to be a part of the retail management domain.

Inventory Management

Good inventory management, while not solely the province of retail management, is essential. Retailers need to have the right products in stock in the right quantities and at the right times if they are to meet customer demand. Too much inventory and the company will face excessive inventory carrying costs. Too little inventory and the store may run out, missing out on sales and disappointing customers. Effective inventory management requires insight into both supply and demand—as well as the ability to balance the two and handle unexpected changes in either. Enterprise software designed for retailers that integrates inventory, demand, and supply chain management is invaluable for optimizing this aspect of retail management.

Warehouse Operations

For retail businesses that maintain their own warehouses for storing inventory, managing warehouse operations so that they function efficiently and cost-effectively is another key facet of retail management. Some tasks that fall under this category include tracking products as they enter and leave the facility, picking and packing up products for orders, and handling returns. Again, warehouse management systems and other related technologies can help automate these processes, streamline operations, reduce the likelihood of errors, and provide analytics to optimize warehouse management.

Order Fulfillment

Order fulfillment is an important part of the retail management process for retailers conducting digital commerce. Retailers must refine their delivery processes to ensure that they can meet customer expectations for timely order delivery. This relates not only to receiving orders but to picking, packing, and sending them out the door. For large retailers managing hundreds of orders or more per day, this can quickly become a challenge. Investing in software to handle key aspects of order fulfillment allows retailers to keep up with order demand and customer expectations. Systems that offer capabilities for managing logistics partners can further fine-tune this aspect of retail management.

Purchasing and Supplier Management

Retailers must first purchase inventory from suppliers before they can sell to customers. Thus, strategic procurement practices and supply chain management are vital. Disruptions to global supply chains have become more frequent, so it’s more important than ever that retailers manage their supplier relationships—exchanging data, matching supply with demand, and collaborating on process improvements. Retailers with good customer data and demand forecasting capabilities will be in the best position to enlist their suppliers as partners in good retail management.

Customer Service

One of the primary goals of retail management is to deliver a satisfying customer experience, thereby driving sales and revenue. Retailers may choose to differentiate on any number of factors: speed, cost, convenience, reliability, friendliness, or high-touch experiences. Whatever the case, a significant portion of retail management is ensuring that the company provides the intended level of customer service at every shopper touchpoint, whether that’s helping a customer find the right aisle for eye drops or quickly rectifying a package lost in transit for an online buyer.

Human Resources Management

The retail sector directly provided 32.2 million jobs for American workers (15.2% of the national total), making it the largest private-sector employer of any industry in the country, according to an NRF report. But it can also be a bit of a revolving door: The retail and wholesale industry had the highest turnover rate of all sectors, at 24.9%, according to a recent survey about turnover in various industries. That can be costly in terms of both training and the potential impact on the customer experience.

Aside from the goods themselves, employees are retailers’ most important asset—and often the most expensive. Thus, human resources management is a crucial aspect of retail management. It includes hiring, onboarding, and training employees; forecasting staffing needs and planning shifts; managing performance and coaching; addressing employee conflicts or questions; and maintaining compliance with relevant labor laws and health and safety regulations.

Accounting and Financial Management

Any discussion of retail management will naturally focus on all of the aforementioned topics. But without solid financial management and accounting practices, a retailer couldn’t stay in business. This management segment includes a host of processes required for day-to-day operations management, including budgeting, cash flow management, financial planning, and risk analysis. An ERP system purpose-built for the industry will make it easier to track, report on, and analyze financial and accounting data, delivering insights that support more informed retail management decision-making, and promote growth and deliver greater returns over time.

Analytics and Business Intelligence

Analytics and business intelligence can help companies make daily retail management decisions. These tools shed light on all aspects of retail operations, including customer service and support, human capital management, inventory, and accounting. Some of the more common retail metrics specifically related to store performance that companies will track include sales goals, average basket size, conversion rates, and footfall (the number of people entering a store). For analyzing retail operations or predicting staff turnover, analytics and business intelligence systems can help retail managers identify both problems in need of fixing and opportunities to pursue.

13 Tips for Retail Managers

Successful retail management requires mastery of diverse business functions in physical and digital channels alike. Modern retail managers must navigate everything from staff development to merchandising, while delivering consistent customer experiences at in-person and online touchpoints. The following tips can help retail managers excel in today’s omnichannel retail environment.

  1. Recruit and onboard staff effectively: It can take a village to manage a retail operation. Dedicated, well-trained employees are needed to handle the multitude of retail tasks, from helping customers in-store to making inventory ordering decisions. Having the right people in place starts with recruiting staff members and onboarding them effectively. Retail managers are responsible for developing and implementing onboarding processes and training curriculum for their retail teams.
  2. Supervise and inspire your team: Leading and motivating retail staff is one of a retail manager’s primary duties. Managers have to take care of their employees so that those employees can then take care of the store and its customers. This includes actively supervising staff, coaching and motivating them to perform well, and mentoring those who aspire to become retail managers themselves. Setting attainable goals, creating a culture of recognition for achieving performance benchmarks, eliciting and responding to feedback, creating development opportunities, and offering financial and other incentives, such as flexible scheduling, are some common strategies suitable for inspiring retail teams.
  3. Optimize staff scheduling: Creating employee schedules is a complicated aspect of retail workforce management. Many factors influence scheduling decisions, such as expected sales volume, employee availability and skill sets, store size, peak sales days or periods, and budget. Requests for time off, overtime considerations, and labor laws must also be considered. Human resources management software (HRMS) with scheduling functionality can optimize what would be a time-consuming process if handled manually.
  4. Deliver exceptional customer service: Good customer service is the lifeblood of a successful retail business. What “good” customer service might look like may vary by brand, but it often includes greeting and proactively helping customers, keeping stores stocked and well organized, having an easy-to-navigate website and simple checkout, and quickly responding to customer complaints, whether they are delivered in person, by phone, or over a chatbot. Retail managers set expectations for the kind of customer experience that staff must deliver. They must coach employees on how to meet those expectations and measure customer service performance relative to their goals.
  5. Maintain store presentation: The retail experience is as influenced by its environment as it is by its customer service. Retail managers should focus on customers’ end-to-end journey, starting with their store entry or website landing page, while they’re browsing, and lasting through checkout. In physical locations, this means maintaining clean, organized, and easily navigable spaces. For ecommerce, it requires intuitive website design and flawless navigation. Just as important as these customer-facing areas are stockrooms, warehouses, and employee areas. Keeping those areas tidy and well organized helps employees across all channels, which, in turn, helps customers.
  6. Strategically organize merchandise: Determining how to organize and present products in a store or online has an effect on both customer experiences and sales. In fact, it’s a critical aspect of any retail merchandising strategy. The strategic placement of products on endcaps, at eye level on store shelves, and in high-traffic areas, as well as grouping complementary products, are all ways to influence purchasing behavior. These merchandising principles apply equally to ecommerce, where strategic product placement on landing pages can guide customer decisions. Though most retailers organize products by category or customer need, factors such as seasonal demand and cross-selling opportunities also shape placement decisions.
  7. Oversee inventory management: Managing inventory is a significant element of the retail management job, given that retailers need to control their costs and protect their margins by not overstocking merchandise. At the same time, they need to prevent stockouts, which could cause customers to spend their money elsewhere. Some aspects of inventory management that retail managers will want to focus on include inventory audits and counts, managing stock levels, tracking key inventory metrics, working closely with suppliers, and staying on top of the shelf life of perishable goods. Inventory management software can monitor these tasks and reduce the likelihood of errors.
  8. Implement shrinkage prevention measures: Inventory shrinkage, whether due to shoplifting, theft, fraud, administrative error, or mismanagement, is a costly concern for retailers. The average retail shrink rate was 1.6% in 2022—representing $112.1 billion in losses, according to NRF’s national retail security survey. Although some shrinkage is unavoidable, the goal is to minimize it as much as possible. Actions to stem shrinkage include the use of advanced security technologies (surveillance cameras, RFID tags, fraud detection, and integrated security platforms, to name a few), training employees on how to prevent theft and errors, and modernizing stock management processes to help stop inventory from going missing.
  9. Create and maintain accurate records: Given how quickly things change in the retail environment, it’s essential to maintain accurate and up-to-date records for finance and accounting, transactions and returns, and inventory and supplier management. Accuracy is an area where enterprise software designed for the retail environment becomes invaluable, as it can centralize both data collection and recordkeeping.
  10. Develop and execute sales promotions: Sales promotions are an effective way to attract customers, increase sales, build brand awareness, and move excess inventory. That said, discounts, deals, and other incentives should be well thought out. Retail managers should first set clear goals for the promotion, determine the type of promotion that will best meet those objectives, calculate the costs of (and expected returns on) the promotion, market the promotion, and measure the results.
  11. Leverage technology: The right tools can help a retail manager improve and automate many of the business processes needed for their roles, such as inventory management, supplier relations, sales, customer support, and service. In addition, by implementing enterprise software designed to support a retail business, retail managers can also make use of built-in tools for reporting and analytics that can inform data-driven decisions and help enhance retail operations over time.
  12. Analyze customer feedback: Dealing with customer complaints is about more than addressing an issue at a specific moment. Customer feedback, bad or good, can be a robust source of data to mine for enriching retail operations. Voice-of-the-customer programs dedicated to collecting and analyzing customer feedback from a variety of sources—customer support calls, reviews, online behavior, and more—can help retailers tap into their customers’ needs, expectations, and preferences to lay the groundwork for improvements that touch on all aspects of their operations.
  13. Ensure regulatory compliance: Retail managers play an important role in ensuring compliance with labor laws, packaging and shipping rules, and anti-discrimination regulations that protect customers. The more that these regulatory requirements can be built into day-to-day business processes and operations, the more likely they will be met. Some steps retail managers can take to ensure regulatory compliance include developing a plan that describes the relevant regulations and outlines how to meet them, providing training for employees and managers, conducting regular audits and assessments, and staying current on evolving regulations and requirements.

11 Retail Management Best Practices

The sheer number of responsibilities that retail managers must juggle creates a challenging role. Staying on top of it all is no small task. But the following proven best practices can help elevate retail management outcomes.

1. Optimize Store Layouts

The layout of a store—brick-and-mortar or online—can have a profound effect on the customer experience and, ultimately, sales and profit. Product placement, visual merchandising, and customer flow (how customers move through a store and the interactions they have from entry to exit) can influence the shopper’s experience and, hopefully, boost sales. Organizing aisles and shelves and optimizing landing pages and digital product presentation are essential for optimization. For example, retail managers understand that they should place impulse buys in high-traffic areas or at checkout and make the highest demand items easy to find and purchase. Highlighting seasonal items and new products can also be effective.

2. Address Customer Issues Proactively

Customer complaints and concerns are a given for retailers. But, to the extent possible, it’s important to address customer issues in a proactive manner—or, at the very least, in a timely fashion—and make sure they don’t persist. Analyzing customer interactions and transactional data can illuminate problems that need to be addressed, allowing retailers to manage expectations by offering frequent updates on order status, shipping notifications, or website and operational maintenance issues. Giving personalized product recommendations or reorder reminders drawn from past purchases is another way to stay ahead of customer issues. Many retailers find it beneficial to invest in self-service options for customers, so they can quickly find the answers or solutions they’re seeking—which happens to be an area in which artificial intelligence (AI) can help, in the form of chatbots or assistants. Regularly monitoring and assessing customer service options is another way for a retailer to maintain its standards related to customer experiences and interactions.

3. Conduct Market Research

Investing in market research—collecting, analyzing, and interpreting data about a target market, including customer needs, preferences, behaviors, competitors, and industry trends—will pay off on multiple retail management fronts. Retailers are able to better align their products, services, store design, and marketing to meet customer desires, create delightful experiences, and keep up-to-date on the latest industry and competitive developments. They can also uncover opportunities for market expansion and growth. In short, combining internal data with insights into the broader marketplace and the customer (and potential customer) base can guide better, data-driven decision-making. These efforts may include primary market research (from surveys, customer interviews, focus groups, employee feedback, and sales data, for example) and secondary market research (such as case studies, market trend reporting, and competitive benchmarking).

4. Develop, Test, and Continuously Improve Products and Services

The retail marketplace does not stand still, so companies must be in continuous improvement mode to succeed. Thus, another best practice is to keep developing, testing, and improving the products and services they offer. Market research, as outlined above, can be part of this effort. Retailers can also test new ideas (layouts, new store concepts, products, services) in certain markets or as soft launches to see how they fare before rolling them out more widely. Other practices in this arena include A/B testing (say, a new ecommerce design), soliciting ongoing customer feedback, collecting data (online behavior, transactions, customer feedback), and analyzing it all to discover opportunities for improvement. AI and machine learning can prove helpful here, particularly when integrating and analyzing structured and unstructured data. These technologies can also be deployed to help analyze how customers react to changes in an ecommerce environment.

5. Implement Comprehensive Marketing Strategies

Marketing is another fundamental aspect of retail management because it builds awareness of a retailer’s stores, products, and services and drives sales. While ad hoc tactics may occasionally be effective, a holistic marketing strategy is more likely to yield long-term results. The latter begins with developing a brand identity and unique selling proposition, researching the target market (as described above), executing a consistent omnichannel marketing strategy that serves the various touchpoints along the customer journey, and, finally, analyzing the impact of marketing efforts. In-store marketing can include events, promotions, and visual merchandising efforts, while digital marketing can incorporate search engine optimization, social media campaigns, and personalized email marketing. Some other marketing strategies that apply across channels include promotions, such as price cuts, flash sales, and loyalty programs with benefits.

6. Enhance In-Store Experiences

Maintaining a clean and organized store is table stakes for brick-and-mortar retailers. Thanks to ecommerce and last-mile delivery players, shoppers have a host of reasons for never setting foot in a store, so retailers that want to increase foot traffic (and sales) need to make the in-store experience worth the trip for customers. There are a number of ways retail managers can kick the physical shopping experience up a notch. In addition to providing the highest levels of customer service, they might offer immersive experiences, strategic use of music and lighting for ambience, new technologies that speed up the checkout process, in-store events and experiences, and hands-on product testing. Many retailers today also seek to combine the best of the digital and online worlds by providing a buy online, pickup in-store (BOPIS) option.

7. Use Advanced Retail Management Software

Investing in state-of-the-art retail management technology is one of the most impactful steps retailers can take. Selecting an ERP system that integrates back-office modules with retail management capabilities makes it easier to connect day-to-day operations with the business’s long-term management. Such software can also streamline and automate the most common retail management processes, freeing up retail management professionals to focus on higher-level strategy.

8. Enhance Customer Experience

Given how competitive the retail industry has become, with mammoth retailers able to undercut smaller ones on pricing, customer experience can be a key selling point for small to midsize retailers unable to participate in the race to the bottom. Prioritizing and enhancing the customer experience, though, should be a best practice for any retail company. Understanding target customers’ preferences, concerns, and expectations is the first step. Then retail managers can craft the kinds of experiences that will wow shoppers, whether that translates as self-service options, in-store or online events or experiences, high-touch customer service, loyalty programs, or personalized assistance and offers.

9. Employ Effective Pricing Strategies

Setting the right prices for products is crucial; pricing impacts profitability, sales volume, cash flow, competitive stance, and customer satisfaction. A retail price must incorporate the cost of the product, a markup to cover internal expenses, and some kind of profit margin. Pricing approaches vary, ranging from simple acceptance of a manufacturer’s suggested retail price to demand-based dynamic pricing, competitor-driven pricing, and value-based pricing. Determining the most effective pricing strategies can take some experimentation to get right. And, of course, the strategy may differ for different product categories and end up evolving with time. Retailers that have good enterprise data on transactions, financials, and customer input can analyze those factors to determine which pricing strategies best achieve their aims.

10. Use Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)

You can’t manage what you don’t measure, as is often said. Businesses in most sectors track KPIs to manage important aspects of company performance so they can make well-informed decisions. In the retail industry, KPIs that help retail managers assess and address day-to-day and long-term operational performance includesales per square foot, customer conversion rate, sales per employee, average transaction value, year-over-year revenue growth, net promoter score, inventory turnover, net and gross profit, customer retention, and customer lifetime value. Some KPIs that pertain specifically to ecommerce retailers are shopping cart abandonment rate, average order value, and conversion rate (in this case, the percentage of website visitors who convert into paying customers). Retail managers can also develop their own KPIs for a preferred area of focus, such as customer service or inventory management.

11. Identify and Address Pain Points

Some of the biggest retail success stories started with a company that was able to identify and address a thorny pain point for shoppers—think of Zappos and its hassle-free returns or Nordstrom’s focus on customer service. Of course, every retailer should be on the lookout for expressed (and, more importantly, unexpressed) pain points in the retail process. For issues that are apparent, root-cause analyses can help retail managers get to the bottom of the problem. For problems that are less obvious, it may take a bit more effort to identify what needs to be fixed. Mapping out the customer journey is a good way to start, so be on the lookout for any bottlenecks or pain points arising anywhere. Retailers should also tackle employee pain points—because anything that impacts employees’ experiences, satisfaction, or productivity will ultimately affect customers, business performance, or both. Other areas ripe for investigation include technology systems, supply chain and supplier relationships, and other key partnerships.

Discover How NetSuite Enhances Retail Management

Investing in an enterprise software platform designed specifically for the retail sector can deliver significant retail management benefits and bottom-line results. NetSuite for Retail empowers retailers to deliver a unified customer experience across channels, including brick-and-mortar stores, web and mobile commerce, and call centers. Retail leaders and managers are granted full visibility for all business functions, as well as a dedicated view of the customer derived from all channels and touchpoints, enabling retailers to make data-driven decisions about inventory, staffing, and customer service.

Some of the functionality that holds particular appeal for retail managers includes real-time inventory visibility, unified order management, and fulfillment for all channels; marketing tools for targeting and personalizing offers based on customer segments; financials and accounting for all store locations, marketplaces, and ecommerce platforms; centralized pricing and promotion management; and a full-featured, yet mobile-friendly, point-of-sale system. NetSuite for Retail also allows retail managers to easily customize it to suit their specific requirements, which can help them adapt quickly to changing market conditions and customer needs.

Successful retail management requires the coordination of many moving parts, all taking place within an extremely dynamic industry. With the right business-aligned strategy, people, processes, and technology, a retail management team can play a leading role in the overall success of the business by ensuring that the retailer can efficiently and effectively meet customer demands and expectations in a way that increases revenue and profitability.

#1 Cloud ERP
Software

Free Product Tour

Retail Management FAQs

What is an example of retail management?

Retail management refers to the management and oversight of the many processes involved in the daily operations of a retail establishment. This may include brick-and-mortar stores, ecommerce sites, or both. Thus, there are many examples of retail management at work, such as managing and optimizing inventory, overseeing order management and fulfillment, designing store layouts and product placement, scheduling employee shifts, and providing customer service.

What is the goal of retail management?

Retail management includes all of the activities required to run, maintain, and grow a retail business. At the highest level, this begins with developing and operationalizing a retail management strategy that aligns with the company’s overarching mission and goals. For almost any retailer, however, the goal of retail management is the same: to most effectively and efficiently meet customer demand in a way that drives revenues and profitability for the company.

Is retail management a good career option?

Retail management is a broad function within a retail business, one that involves many responsibilities that may fall under a single role or be split up among several people. Retail management can be a good career option for those who are passionate about driving revenues and service in a customer-focused industry. Some of the most important skills for a retail manager include leadership qualities, communication, human resources management, organizational strengths, customer service, and sales. Retail managers should be able to juggle multiple tasks and be willing to adapt to changing circumstances.