It’s a wrap.
At least that’s Macy’s take on its decades-old gift-wrapping service, which is now headed the way of the coat check. The Cincinnati-based retail giant will end gift-wrapping services at all but five of its 810 U.S. stores, including all 19 in metro Atlanta, by the end of April.
Macy’s at Lenox Mall wrapped its last gift last week. The retail giant has been quietly discontinuing the service for about three years because of dwindling demand, said spokesman Jim Sluzewski.
“It comes down to the fact it was a service that was little used,” said Sluzewski, who admits opting for gift bags himself. “While a small number of customers expressed disappointment, most customers understand because they’re not using” the service.
But some industry watchers aren’t as forgiving, saying the move puts the department store chain once known for its white-glove service “one step closer to becoming equivalent to discounters like Target and Wal-mart.”
“Macy’s decision to cut out their gift wrap services is penny-wise, but pound-foolish,” says Pam Danziger, president of Unity Marketing and author of the new Gifting Report 2010: The Ultimate Guide to the Consumer Gift-Giving Market. “In a race to the cost-cutting bottom, the discounters will win; they have already mastered the art of providing popular gift items at affordable prices.”
Danziger said department stores like Macy’s need to set themselves apart from the discounters by “recapturing the customer-service experience and delivering it to their customers.” She says customers will pay more for quality service that extends to walking out the door with a perfectly wrapped gift.
“The store that makes the gifting process the easiest and most enjoyable is the one that will capture that $1 out of $10 that consumers have to spend on a gift.”
Danziger’s group surveyed consumers and found three-fourths of the 1,680 gift shoppers surveyed ranked customer service as very or somewhat important to their decision about where to shop for a gift.
It’s unclear how much savings Macy’s will see from discontinuing gift-wrapping, Sluzewski said. And for some Macy’s workers who provided gift-wrapping services, it could mean layoffs if they don’t neatly fit into other departments.
Macy’s in Herald Square in New York, Union Square in San Francisco, State Street in Chicago, South Coast Plaza in Orange County, Calif., and Dadeland in Miami will continue to offer gift-wrapping services because of strong customer demand in those stores, Sluzewski said.
In the big picture, the department store has a lot more to worry about than bows, raffia, ribbons and perfectly-creased edges. Macy’s is still trying to smooth out the wrinkles from industry consolidation, and the long-awaited benefits of its My Macy’s initiative — an effort to tailor merchandise to local markets — haven’t quite materialized yet.
Add to that a more financially finicky consumer and gift-wrapping seems the least of Macy’s concerns. “Post-recession consumers now are much more value-conscious and increasingly trading down to discount department stores,” Deutsche Bank analyst Bill Dreher said recently.
For the gift-wrapping-challenged, though, there are always neighborhood nooks like The Paper Source in Virginia-Highland or the gift bags at The Dollar Tree. And at most Macy’s, customers can still get free gift boxes with purchases. Wrapping paper, bows and ribbons will be for sale in the card department.
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