More retailers filed for bankruptcy in the first three months of 2017 than in all of 2016, sparking headlines warning of a retail apocalypse and painting Amazon as the villain. With shoppers' retail spending up versus last year, and 90% of retail sales still conducted in brick-and-mortar outlets, according to the National Retail Federation, those headlines are misleading. True, many established retailers have failed to compete effectively, but others are thriving. What can we learn from their attempts to propel retail and brand growth? Retailers who deliver a preferred shopper experience will win more shopper dollars.

Fresh prepared foods generated $15 billion in sales in supermarkets in 2005, a figure that nearly doubled to about $28 billion last year, according to Technomic, a food industry research firm.

Let's start with the obvious: owning and managing a brand is a harder proposition than ever before. Gone are the days of controlling a brand's image and reputation through owned properties like traditional advertising, packaging and websites. Instead, in today's world, customers (and non-customers) control your brand's image and reputation. That's because 21st-century shoppers look to their peers, and third-parties, for a more "trusted" endorsement, rather than a brand's owned properties. To get there, they turn most often to online marketplaces, and Amazon is their marketplace of choice.

America is a nation of snackaholics. Snacking is now more important than sitting down to three squares each day. How do we know that? Food Navigator told us earlier this year that "growing numbers of young people see no problem in swapping three daily meals for six substantial snacks a day." And the Hartman Group's "The Future of Snacking 2016" report found that 91% of consumers snack multiple times throughout the day and that, "snacking now accounts for half of all eating occasions as America's consumers say that snacking is essential to daily nutrition." We spend over $1 billion a …

A few weeks ago, I met with a new client who told me that in the past their main tactic to drive awareness was in-store sampling. They are a new product in a well-represented personal care category and face a slew of behemoth brands as competitors. When executing an in-store sampling, they would pay anywhere between $1,000 $2,500 per day for the privilege (depending on the retailer). For that day, and a few days after, the client would notice their coupons being used, and would see a lift in sales - but then sales would go flat or even down …

A few weeks ago I wrote an article for "Engage:Moms" about a recent study we fielded related to online grocery shopping. The study found that 80% of consumers surveyed will buy 100% of their groceries in-store and not online. In fact, just 5% say that they do 50% or more of their grocery shopping online.

During last year's election season, we heard pundits and politicians bemoan the effect of algorithms on what news we see, serving up content that reinforces and echoes choices and preferences we've demonstrated through past behavior. Because I happened to watch the Billy Bush bus video, does that make me a Trump supporter? Or if I happened to get click-baited into watching a shark video, does some data engine tag me as an Animals Attack! fan? The answer to those questions appears to be, largely, "yes" and therein lies a problem for our society (we are confined to a machine-determined perspective) …

With smart phones ever-present among us, it's not uncommon to see couples out to dinner not even looking at each other, but rather looking at their phones. I saw this happen just last night as I watched a gentleman spending a good deal of his evening texting on his cell phone. I couldn't imagine what was so important that it could not wait, but I did notice his companion seemed none too pleased with the situation. She likely felt ignored, unimportant, barely noticed, as if she was simply taking up space at the table.

Chief marketing officers surveyed last year indicated that content marketing was the number one tactic they were relying on going forward. And as CPG brands look at creating content that moves product off shelves, it's a short leap to influencer marketing. The good news is that most brands using influencer marketing today seem happy with the performance, at least according to an eMarketer report that found 48% were increasing influencer budgets while only 4% were decreasing.