For global organizations, it is particularly difficult to harmonize global strategy with regional economic variations. These dynamics demand unique people who can be flexible and adapt.

Across the retail industry we see many common trends, such as increasing online trade both nationally and imported from abroad, increased price sensitivity as information becomes more easily distributed and is placed at "your fingertips", as well as even more integrated end-to-end value chains where continuous information exchange and cooperation are crucial to meeting customer demands.

For marketing and positioning for a unique place in a customer’s mind, omnichannel has become one of the overarching concepts in recent years. The wish to seamlessly meet customers in a tailored approach across channels, locations and platforms is rooted in the dream of complete customer preference insight and the ability to address an individual need with a unique offer. Given the latest global shortage of silicon, shortage of semiconductors for a wide variety of digital and mechanical products will also have long backlogs and uncertain delivery times, all affecting consumer preferences and consumption patterns.

The Norwegian retail industry with its wholesalers and distributors has undergone an unprecedented consolidation of the industry in recent decades. For example, the number of grocery chains has gone from many to three, and sales of sporting goods have more than doubled in the past decade where the top three sports retailers accounts for close to 65% of the market and more than 90% of all sales occur through chains. In Norway, the sporting goods industry also occupies a special position as Norwegians spend more per capita on sporting goods than any other country in the world.