Please respond to classmate post: In 1960, Theodore Levitt, coined the word Marketing Myopia while he was a professor at Harvard in his article: “The Heart of the Article.” In his writing, Levitt explains that Myopia is the lack of understanding of what a business can do for its customers. Instead of focusing on the future, he explained that businesses spend a lot of money, time, and labor on their current products (Gallo, 2016). This is seen in several businesses today, where they get so caught up in the ”now” moment that they do not realize the big picture of consumers’ needs.
A prime example of marketing myopia is the rise and fall of the famous toy retailer, Toys R Us. Toys-R-us was the leader in toys, babies, and party needs for children. Adults loved the store, too. Unfortunately, the toy store was forced to file bankruptcy in the spring of 2018. A lot of rumors have circulated that Amazon was the demise of Toys-R-Us, however, they struggled before Amazon came into existence. Toys-R-Us was known for having large amounts of inventory, but oftentimes cut costs in labor expenses. This made it difficult for parents to shop in the store without a child. Parents wanted to be able to locate the product with ease, ask questions, and be shown how some products worked. This was hard to do when the staff was limited. Walmart became their biggest rival, Walmart only focused on what appropriate age groups wanted and parents weren’t overwhelmed when looking for the “it” toy. So, when the competition is tough, you have to compete and Toys-R-Us did not. It’s true, online shopping didn’t help matters, but the struggles of Toys “R” Us predate the boom in online shopping. Many of its wounds were self-inflicted (Isidore, 2018).
Another company that suffered from myopia, was Movie Gallery. Movie Gallery was a favorite chain store video rental company that was convenient for picking a movie or video game to rent for a couple of nights. As a young child and early teenage years, I looked forward to going every Friday night and spending my weekends watching the latest movies available. As times changed, so did the consumers. Consumers finally had the option to have movies delivered to their homes from DVD.com, which later became the famous streaming company we know as Netflix. At the time, they were looking at the “now” of business by making sure that they had the latest rentals out, yet they failed to compete with the way people got their movies.
References:
Gallo, A. (2016, August 22). A refresher on marketing myopia. Harvard Business Review. Retrieved August 8, 2022, from https://hbr.org/2016/08/a-refresher-on-marketing-myopia
Isidore, C. (2016, March 15). Amazon didn’t Kill toys ‘r’ us. here’s what did. CNNMoney. Retrieved August 8, 2022, from https://money.cnn.com/2018/03/15/news/companies/toys-r-us-closing-blame/index.html
