EDITORIAT

Arc you rcady for Budget Bob?

I UST WHEN most traditional retailers were belU ginning to believe that they could co-exist with the retail warehouse phenomenon, along comes a new shopping mania with the potential to be equally serious competition.

Seemingly overnight, television shopping shows have gained a widespread audience ofeager buyers lured by low prices. Beginning on cable tv and now expanding to UHF stations, Home Shopping Network sells discount merchandise seven days a week, 24 hours a day on phone-in tv shows hosted by pitchmen like "Budget Bob" Circosta.

HSN, which reaches about 8 million people presently and plans to become a nationwide network as extensive as ABC or CBS, sold to 350,000 people in the last nine months. On average, each customer bought 17 items at $32 each, according to the company. Sales were more than $500000 per day. Combined, all the shopping shows expect an audience of20 million by early fall.

The discount shopping shows have a dual appeal: price tags 50% off list (appraisals furnished) and the appeal ofcurling up on your couch, phone in hand. As Budget Bob pus it: "in the comfort, convenience and safetyof your ownhome."While the prices arenot always the super deal claimed, there is no discounting the convenience. To those who are sick ofdriving, parking, putting up with weather problems and low life clerks, tv shopping seems a boon. The brokerage firm Donaldson, Lufkin and Jenrette's study of fv and computer shopping programs prompted them to forecast that by the late 1990s up to one-third of all purchases will be done away from the store.

While the merchandise presented is a widely varying mix, hardware and housewares items have been a not inconsequential percentage ofthe total. They're not selling plywood and 2x4s yet, but they are moving other categories of merchandise on a major basis.

At this stage, no one really knows if this latest tv offspring will prove to be a flash in the pan or a major new source of competition to existing stores. But given the serious dollars turned so far, it's a concept that bears careful watching.

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