Terms of Trade · Edition 2: The trading pack
Sell-through
Definition
Units sold as a share of units bought, for a line, a range or a season, at full price or in total. The merchandiser’s measure of whether the buy was right, and the one number that connects what was designed, what was bought and what the customer actually wanted.
Field note
Sell-through is a traditional merchandising measure that single-handedly tells you how effective your design, marketing and ecommerce functions are. Or not.
Board question
What was full-price sell-through on the last season by range, and which function owns the lines that missed?
Applied through
Strategic Clarity in the Cat’s Whiskers, a business that knows what it is and competes where it can win; the Review reads the range as the customer meets it on the site.
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