This happened about a decade ago ... a CEO hated, and I mean HATED "old fashioned" merchandise sold by a brand. So the CEO discontinued a bunch of long-term winning items, replacing them with what were called "fashion forward" items.
Sales dropped, almost immediately, by about 10%. The CEO pressured everybody to figure out "what was wrong", but everybody knew what was wrong.
Think about McDonalds ... what happens if they discontinue the Quarter Pounder with Cheese? It almost wouldn't matter what they replaced it with - they're gonna suffer a sales decline.
Anytime you want to reinvent your merchandise assortment you almost have to reinvent your customer file / community at the same time. Ticking off your existing customers while failing to cultivate new customers is just a classic recipe for trouble.
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