Where Do You Stand?

So, maybe I’m a snob, but I truly dislike JCPenney. That is until now. Living in an exurb of St. Louis, JCPenney is the only department store within 15 minutes of my house, so I’ve been forced to go there a time or two. When trying to find a quick replacement to the dress my daughter has outgrown or the shoes that suddenly don’t fit my son, I have wandered through the women’s clothing section. The fact is I have left feeling totally left out.

They have plenty of merchandise for my mother-in-law’s generation and lots of items for the junior set but nothing for me. The good news is that it appears this may be changing. With the introduction of American Living by Ralph Lauren and the introduction of their Simply Green brand, I am eager to explore JCPenney again.

The image of American Living is comfortable, messy and beautiful just like the idealized life of middle America. The American Living launch gave me hope that Ralph Lauren could lead JCPenney through a reinvention that helps middle America redefine itself in a way that is deeper than the promise of Target and better defined than the promise of Kohl’s. If you haven’t seen this, take a look:

Then recently JCPenney announced their Simply Green line. It is an effort by the company to enhance their private label merchandise by adding the Simple Green ingredient brand to those items that meet predetermined green standards. The next time I’m at JCPenney – possibly out of desire rather than necessity – I will take a look at these items.

These new brands and the tagline, or “philosophy” as the company calls it, of “Every Day Matters” gives me reason to believe JCPenney may be at the beginning of a very interesting reinvention.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, March 26th, 2008 at 1:46 pm and is filed under Branding and Positioning, Where We Stand. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.