Boston, Mass. – January 5, 2004 – The National Retail Federation (NRF), the world's largest retail trade association; ProfitLogic, whose suite of Merchandise Optimization solutions helps retailers make more profitable merchandising decisions; and Karabus Management, a leading North American retail consulting firm focused on helping retailers significantly enhance financial performance, today announced the Sunday Session: “Merchandise Optimization: The Next Frontier” at NRF’s Big Show. The seminar takes place on Sunday, January 11, 2003 from  8:00 am to 11:30 am ET in Room 1E12/13 at the Jacob Javits Center in New York City and will feature AnnTaylor, Charming Shoppes, and Northern Group Retail.

The goal of this year’s seminar is to provide practical insights and knowledge about how retailers can extend the use of Merchandise Optimization from markdowns to other complex decision points in the merchandising process such as: determining buy quantities, creating the ideal assortment breadth and depth, figuring out the best pre-pack quantities, and improving size profiling and store clustering.

“ Merchandise Optimization is such a hot topic because retailers can implement these solutions within months, achieve a quick ROI, and generate significant financial benefits without a major disruption to their organization,” said David Hogan, head of the NRF CIO Council, who will provide opening remarks for the Seminar.  “Retailers have expressed interest in learning more about Merchandise Optimization and its use beyond markdowns, so we’ve put together a program in which they can hear about other retailers’ experiences and apply Merchandise Optimization to both markdowns and assortment planning decisions.”

The first presentation, “Merchandise Optimization Priorities: From Markdowns to Assortment Planning” will be delivered by Stephen Granovsky, President of Karabus Management. Next, Kim Decker, Senior Vice President of Allocation of AnnTaylor, will deliver the keynote presentation, “Serving the Client – Leveraging Advanced Analytics to Get Closer to the Customer and Improve Merchandising Effectiveness.”  Then, attendees will participate in an interactive case co-developed by ProfitLogic and IBM. The case study will demonstrate the benefits of using Merchandise Optimization solutions for assortment planning.

The seminar concludes with a panel discussion titled, “Merchandise Optimization: Lessons from the Field,” which includes: AnnTaylor’s Beth Stivers, Vice President Process Design; Northern Reflections’ Lara Smith, GMM; and Charming Shoppes’ Joe Sperlunto, Director, Information Technology.

If you are interested in attending or would like more information, please visit: http://www.profitlogic.com/nrf_2004_email/index.htm.