As part of a strategic integration, the two-year-old Macy’s by Mail catalog is changing its name to Macys.com. The catalog and Web units of the mutichannel retailer, owned by Federated Department Stores, will move from Brooklyn, NY, to Manhattan. Another Federated unit, Bloomingdale’s by Mail, is also moving to the same building this spring, although it won’t undergo any other changes. Macy’s by Mail president Ron Ramseyer left Feb. 1; CEO Kent Anderson, who has been running the Macys.com Web business, will run the new Macys.com unit.
Gary Ostrager, vice president of marketing for Macys.com, says the print catalog makes up 50% of Macy’s direct sales. “But our goal is to dramatically grow the Web business,” he says. The company will use the catalog to drive sales to the Website.
Despite the name change to emphasize the Web channel, Macy’s has no immediate plans to scale back the print catalog. Ostrager would not divulge the catalog’s circulation or frequency, but he says, “We’ll continue to target and segment mailings to market to the customers who are most likely to prefer to shop in a nonstore environment.” But Ostrager says the company felt that the direct division should operate under one name: “It was sort of a coin toss as to which name to choose.”