Education

Learn about educational events, informative webinars and special reports, designed and prepared to help members stay up-to- date on current business topics, trends and issues!

Trends: Daily Coffee Consumption Up

Americans once again are waking up to coffee. The percentage of Americans drinking coffee on a daily basis is up this year, thanks in part to better-tasting gourmet brews becoming more popular across all age groups in the U.S. That’s according to The National Coffee Association’s 2017 National Coffee Drinking Trends tracking report, which found that the percentage of…

Retail Profile: Plum’s Cooking Company

When Penny Klinedinst learned her friend Caroline Peterson, then owner of Plum’s Cooking Company, was retiring and planning to close the much-loved cookware shop, Klinedinst knew she had to find a way to keep Plum’s open. So she bought the store. “She was going to close the doors and that didn’t sit well with me,” says Klinedinst, who also owns a neighboring store in the…

Looking for Local

Local retailers seek local products. That’s the theme across the nation as specialty retailers, many of whom also find they benefit from customers looking to shop at local businesses, try to return the favor with nearby producers. “We always focus on finding local products,” says Dan Saklad, owner of, along with wife Diana, Whisk in Cary, N.C. “We are local, so we do…

Complimentary Education & Learning Opportunities with IHA

IHA Offers frequent webinars to keep you informed of the latest industry developments and educated on best business practices. Take part in an upcoming webinar starting in September or watch a previous recorded webinar on a wide variety of topics. Shifting the Paradigm: One-Size-Does-NOT-fit-all for Shared Warehousing 12:00 pm CDT September 13 Housewares firms…

Stats: How Housewares Fare in Home Trends

You know what is selling in your store, but do you know how home products are faring overall? Those smart folks at The NPD Group tallied up their data for last year and the results give a snapshot of the U.S. housewares economy. Here’s a look at what happened around the home in 2016. In the kitchen: Coffee/espresso is the biggest kitchen appliance category with…

Trends: Brick and Mortar Stands Up to Online

While a vast majority of Americans are now online shoppers, a new survey finds that those same customers also seek out brick-and-mortar stores. According to the survey from the Pew Research Center, some 8-in-10 Americans shop online, compared to a similar study done in June 2000 when just 22 percent of Americans had made a purchase online. Still, the study found that…

Reinventing Retail in the Era of Connected Devices

When it comes to selling connected devices, retailers have a tough job. Smart products are often complex, can require more up-front education and suffer from higher return rates than their more traditional brethren. As a result, efforts by some retailers to expand into the consumer Internet of Things (IoT) and smart home ended in disappointment. Office retailer Staples, who…

Retail Profile: Thyme in the Kitchen

Thyme in the Kitchen may be tucked into a historic, Westside neighborhood in Evansville, Ind., but the store pulls in visitors from all over, many of whom are on their way to cities like Nashville some two hours away. The reason? Eye-catching billboards posted along major highways around Evansville, which though a lovely place, is not typically thought of as a destination…

Security in a Connected-Aplicance World

My washing machine talks to my thermostat. Amazon Alexa talks to my lights and motion sensors talk to my oven. But as these conversations proliferate in my home (and in the cloud), who’s listening in? Big companies? Hackers? More and more consumers are starting to ask these tough questions, demanding that companies provide answers. Or worse— they’re put off by the whole idea…