如果想知道梅西百貨為什么需要自我改造，為什么這家百貨巨頭想做出改變以及為什么這樣做是如此的富有挑戰(zhàn)，大家或許可以從對比它最近發(fā)給顧客的兩份宣傳材料開始。

其中之一是一份短小精悍的價目表，針對最重要的假期購物旺季，是一次新營銷活動的核心。這份宣稱材料名為《我們所愛的禮物》，囊括了125種商品，是出于戰(zhàn)略考慮從梅西百貨銷售的數(shù)萬種商品中抽出來的一小部分。它用豐富的精美照片和優(yōu)雅的字體向人們展示了舒適的Ugg長袍以及180美元的星戰(zhàn)主題無人機等商品，而且通篇未提到打折，“40%折上折”、“全場3-7.5折”等以畫圈強調(diào)的文字均無處可尋。如果非要說點兒什么的話，。那就是這本宣傳冊更像出自像Nordstrom和Saks一類更高端的零售商之手。

同時，它和梅西百貨短短幾天前發(fā)的另一份宣傳冊幾乎截然不同。后者著力宣傳的是夏令時行將結(jié)束之際的大幅折扣——就算真有這樣的促銷活動，這份宣傳材料體現(xiàn)出的執(zhí)行情況也不足以取信（那里面說Tommy Hilfiger休閑裝打6.5折）。這本宣傳冊布局混亂，跟超市打折券郵件差不多，流露出一絲垂死掙扎的意味。

《我們所愛的禮物》代表了梅西百貨向往的未來。作為美國最大百貨連鎖，該公司正設法讓全美664家店重拾高端品牌潮流引領(lǐng)者的名號，這項工作影響深遠，而《我們所愛的禮物》正是其中的一部分。夏令時末段的打折活動則反映了梅西百貨難以逾越的現(xiàn)狀：大型零售商所經(jīng)營的商品非常相似，它們吸引購物者的唯一途徑就是打折，這也是為什么它們都在“樂此不?！卑l(fā)宣傳冊的原因。

這出“雙冊記”是梅西百貨長期以來身份危機的一個縮影，而且它需要迅速化解這場危機。梅西百貨同時擁有開了38家分店的Bloomingdale’s百貨連鎖。今年11月梅西百貨披露，同店銷售額（也就是剔除新開設和剛剛關(guān)閉店面的銷售數(shù)據(jù)）連續(xù)第11個季度滑坡。和2015年的高點相比，公司股價已下跌70%以上。扭轉(zhuǎn)頹勢的任務落在了今年3月份升任首席執(zhí)行官的杰夫?甘內(nèi)特身上，他已經(jīng)在梅西百貨工作了34年。假期購物旺季約占梅西百貨年銷售額的30%，而且是部分消費者一年中光顧梅西百貨的唯一機會。甘內(nèi)特及其團隊推出的舉措將面臨首次大考。

甘內(nèi)特的計劃代號“北極星”，和梅西百貨的標識相呼應。這項計劃非常倚重《我們所愛的禮物》所代表的方法，它強調(diào)梅西百貨不光是商場，還是零售“權(quán)威”——56歲的甘內(nèi)特很喜歡用這個詞。他告訴《財富》雜志：“顧客到我們這兒確實是為了時尚策劃和指南，我們在這方面超過了其他零售品牌?！彼Ｍ跁r尚、美容、居家用品、甚至科技方面更充分地利用對顧客的這種影響。這就意味著梅西百貨需要淡化打折概念，讓店內(nèi)變得更有條理一些，以便其圍繞較熱門品牌營造出精挑細選的氛圍，從而吸引更多顧客并提高銷售利潤。

但有一個潛在問題——如果不打折的商品過多，梅西百貨就有可能趕走那些打算“抄底”的購物者，而后者在該公司250億美元的年銷售額中占了很大一塊。簡言之，甘內(nèi)特想擦亮梅西百貨的“品味”招牌，同時仍成為零售商所說的“現(xiàn)象級商場”，而要完成這項穿針一般精準的任務，其難度不亞于把滿滿一袋子玩具從煙囪眼里抖下去。

相信梅西百貨將輕松地再次獲得購物者青睞，這可能有點盲目樂觀。這家連鎖商場的市場份額一直在流失，面對地位穩(wěn)固的零售商時也在節(jié)節(jié)敗退，其中包括實力強大的亞馬遜以及從購物網(wǎng)站起家、而今處于優(yōu)勢地位的公司，比如Stitch Fix和Revolve。年輕消費者正成群結(jié)隊地離梅西百貨而去?？荞Y、Michael Kors和Ralph Lauren也壓低了百貨商場的銷售占比，而且抱怨說百貨業(yè)的打折文化有損于它們的品牌，這可不是個好兆頭。就連耐克最近也含含糊糊地說“平庸的”零售商已經(jīng)讓它受夠了，而且將更加依賴自營商店和電子商務網(wǎng)站。

這些都是甘內(nèi)特忙著解決問題。從此前長期擔任CEO、現(xiàn)為執(zhí)行董事長的特里?倫德格倫手中接過指揮權(quán)后，甘內(nèi)特對商場的雜亂和購物者的離去開誠布公，從而贏得了投資者贊譽。咨詢公司SW Retail Advisors總裁斯泰西?韋德里茨說：“我們聽到梅西百貨在探討設實際問題，而不是說那些華爾街想聽的話，這很好?！备蕛?nèi)特牽頭對高管團隊進行了調(diào)整（三年內(nèi)的第三次），挖來eBay高層霍爾?勞頓擔任他的副手，并且整合了梅西百貨不斷膨脹的銷售策劃部門。

今年的假期購物旺季消費者將看到“北極星”計劃對梅西百貨旗下商場的影響。店內(nèi)關(guān)鍵位置將擺放以“我們所愛的禮物”為主題的展板，被稱為“我的造型設計師”的個人導購將為此提供支持并進行推廣，他們是梅西百貨的一個小團隊，但重要性與日俱增（假期旺季過后，梅西百貨將繼續(xù)按“It List”的內(nèi)容管理那些必須陳列的商品）。它要吸引的是消費較多的購物客。同時，按照調(diào)整后的會員積分獎勵計劃，梅西百貨將為最重要的那十分之一顧客提供更多優(yōu)惠，比如獨家銷售商品和贈送美容沙龍服務。這10%顧客每年的平均消費為1200美元。

隨著此前幾年采取的行動取得成果，密切關(guān)注梅西百貨的人還將看到其他變化。更多梅西百貨商場正在采用新方式銷售美容產(chǎn)品，其中的創(chuàng)意則來自Ulta Beauty和Sephora這樣靈活而且快速增長的競爭對手?，F(xiàn)在有20家梅西百貨商場設立了Bluemercury專區(qū)，這是梅西百貨2015年收購的高檔美容連鎖。在更多的商場，清倉商品如今都放到了一個獨立區(qū)域，稱為“最后一幕”，其目的在于不讓這些大打折扣的商品和那些全價銷售的流行品牌共處一室，或者掩蓋了后者的光輝。

傳統(tǒng)觀點認為百貨商場無法在21世紀生存。從J.C. Penney到Sears，再到Dillard’s和高檔商場Neiman Marcus，零售商的艱難處境印證了這種說法。但和同類企業(yè)相比，可以說梅西百貨走出當前低谷的條件最為完備。它屬于少有的幾家同時銷售較高檔商品和大眾市場商品的零售商，而且擁有令人敬畏的營銷和供應鏈部門。梅西百貨的電商業(yè)務也很強大，年銷售額為43億美元，在美國排名第六。這些優(yōu)勢已經(jīng)幫助梅西百貨從投資者和分析師那里爭取到了更多時間，甚至是在它很難判斷今后局勢的情況下。

零售行業(yè)資訊公司Marvin Traub Associates首席執(zhí)行官莫蒂默?辛格說：“讓戰(zhàn)艦掉頭需要很長時間，而且存在讓人難以相信的危險?！爆F(xiàn)在甘內(nèi)特身上的壓力就是要在不斷變化的消費者口味造成梅西百貨這艘戰(zhàn)艦傾覆前讓它變得煥然一新。

幾乎沒有哪家零售公司像梅西百貨這樣在美國歷史上占據(jù)著重要位置。梅西百貨由羅蘭德?H?梅西創(chuàng)立于1858年，最初是紐約市的一家紡織品商店。到20世紀初，它已經(jīng)成為美國多個主要城市的基石。1947年的經(jīng)典圣誕電影《34街奇跡》奠定了它在流行文化中的龍頭位置。面積達百萬平方英尺的梅西百貨旗艦店是紐約五大游客最多的景點，它每年一次的獨立日煙花表演和感恩節(jié)游行吸引著數(shù)以百萬計的電視觀眾。如今，每年至少在梅西百貨購物一次的美國人多達4100萬。

梅西百貨在特里?倫德格倫治下成為真正的零售巨無霸。倫德格倫擔任CEO十年后，銷售額翻了一番，在2014年達到約280億美元的頂峰。梅西百貨的一些舉措給自己的增長注入了動力，比如先于競爭對手進入電商領(lǐng)域，以及進行了幾次大規(guī)模收購，其中最引人關(guān)注的是2005年買下了May Department Stores。

不過，這些讓梅西百貨成為行業(yè)領(lǐng)跑者的行動也為當前的問題埋下了種子。公司管理層膨脹成了一個笨重的官僚機構(gòu)，對變化反應遲緩。由于采購決策多由總部而非各地管理層做出，梅西百貨提供的商品和其他百貨商場趨于一致，特別是服裝。這讓它進一步陷入打折的惡性循環(huán)中——梅西百貨及其對手共同創(chuàng)造了一片“同質(zhì)海洋”，這讓購物者感到無趣，并且迫使零售商靠折扣來重新吸引顧客。零售咨詢機構(gòu)SageBerry Consulting總裁、Sears和Neiman Marcus前高管史蒂夫?丹尼斯說：“就如何在消費者眼中顯得特殊而言，他們真的是沒有眼光?！?

目前服裝是梅西百貨損失最大的商品類別之一。T.J. Maxx等折扣零售商已經(jīng)變得規(guī)模巨大，來自亞馬遜的威脅也與日俱增——亞馬遜不光推出了自己的時尚品牌，還提供名為“Amazon Prime Wardrobe”的訂購服務。研究機構(gòu)Magid Retail Pulse的數(shù)據(jù)顯示，梅西百貨47%的服裝顧客同樣在亞馬遜上買衣服。金融公司Cowen & Co.則已做出讓梅西百貨顏面掃地的預測——今年亞馬遜將取代梅西百貨，成為美國最大服裝零售商，而且到2021年亞馬遜的市場份額將是梅西百貨的三倍。

就在梅西百貨開始失去增長動力之時，甘內(nèi)特異軍突起。在首席采購，也就是決定梅西百貨銷售哪些商品的位置上坐了五年后，甘內(nèi)特在2014年升任總裁，成為倫德格倫的繼任者。甘內(nèi)特參與了多項讓梅西百貨重回正軌的行動，而這些行動也凸顯了梅西百貨做了多少嘗試及其取得的了了成績。

美容產(chǎn)品就是一例，這類商品為百貨商場帶來約15%的客流。從大約五年前開始，美容產(chǎn)品成了梅西百貨的長期弱項，市場份額落入了Ulta和Sephora等公司之手。這些精品店的競爭優(yōu)勢之一是“開放式銷售”，也就是消費者在不受店員干擾的情況下進行產(chǎn)品試用。梅西百貨卻堅持著上世紀40年代做法，把要銷售的商品擺在柜臺里面；直到現(xiàn)在，也就是銷售額常年滑坡后，梅西百貨才開始在約200家商場試行“開放式銷售”。

梅西百貨對打折時尚品牌Backstage的處理很含糊。最初定位為折扣店的Backstage發(fā)展緩慢。倫德格倫2015年承認：“我不是真的想要這項業(yè)務。”購物者選擇了T.J. Maxx和Marshalls等折扣零售商而不是梅西百貨的局面變得清晰以后，梅西百貨才改變了主意?，F(xiàn)在它決定把這樣的概念引進主要店面，并在45家商場為Backstage劃出了2.5萬平方英尺的營業(yè)面積，約占普通梅西百貨商場的20%，同時還有數(shù)百家店鋪可能設立這樣的Backstage專區(qū)。

據(jù)甘內(nèi)特介紹，Backstage入駐后，商場銷售額同比上升了7%。但寶貴的時間和機會已經(jīng)喪失。零售咨詢機構(gòu)GlobalData Retail董事總經(jīng)理內(nèi)爾?桑德斯說：“以前我們已經(jīng)探討過許多好的措施。他們有予以支持的精力和信心嗎？”

身材高大、衣著整潔的甘內(nèi)特似乎不缺信心。在今年夏天以及秋天和《財富》的對話中，他都重申正在把自己的精力轉(zhuǎn)向聰明的戰(zhàn)略性壓縮上。

有些壓縮集中在供應鏈上。甘內(nèi)特想要的獨家產(chǎn)品提供商要少得多。包括成衣在內(nèi)，這些店選品牌目前占梅西百貨銷售額的29%。甘內(nèi)特想把這個數(shù)字提高到40%，而他采取的措施之一就是砍掉三分之二的提供商，并且要求剩下的廠家把很大一部分產(chǎn)能留給梅西百貨，從而加快產(chǎn)品上市速度——根本目的是為了和Zara和H&M等快時尚品牌競爭。梅西百貨已將某些品類從訂購到上架的時間從幾個月縮短到了八個星期。

但更重要的壓縮出現(xiàn)在商場，甘內(nèi)特正在消除梅西百貨到處都是店員的形象。他說：“我們知道自己的店里面過于雜亂?！睘榻鉀Q這個有損聲譽的問題，梅西百貨正在新澤西州Woodbridge Township的一家商場嘗試甘內(nèi)特所說的“極度剪裁”法——當?shù)刭徫镎咦粉檿r尚的傾向高于梅西百貨的全國平均水平。這家商場將商品種類削減了40%左右，而且會迅速撤下那些過于同質(zhì)化或者已經(jīng)跟不上時尚步伐的商品，取而代之則是更流行的商品。這家店的部分主要商品平均收入上升了10%，甘內(nèi)特對《財富》雜志表示，他能讓所有梅西百貨商場都實現(xiàn)這樣的成績。

在Woodbridge Township的測試驗證了甘內(nèi)特希望通過壓縮庫存而取得成效。理論上講，這樣做會減少清倉處理的商品種類，同時讓商場看起來更高檔，從而提高視覺愉悅度。更小、更容易跟蹤的庫存將帶來更快、更順暢的電商業(yè)務，而且如今商場在這個過程中發(fā)揮著關(guān)鍵作用。

最重要的一點是，甘內(nèi)特認為壓縮品類的好處在于改善顧客服務。這樣店員就不必總是往返于營業(yè)區(qū)域和倉庫，從而有可能成為某些產(chǎn)品的“專家”，比如“It List”上的那些商品，同時和顧客建立更好的關(guān)系?，F(xiàn)在梅西百貨有150家店都只有250名個人導購；在更為精簡的文化中，擔任類似職務的普通員工有望增多。前10%顧客給梅西百貨帶來的收入略低于50%，而這些顧客光臨的次數(shù)較少。營造專屬范圍并提供相應服務有可能提高這些高消費顧客所占的比重，并降低他們等待打折的可能性。

甘內(nèi)特知道自己必須小心處理。除非擁有其他零售商沒有而購物者真正想要的東西，否則減少折扣就可能無異于自殺（2012年J.C. Penney的類似舉措就造成銷售額暴跌，并帶來了一場持久危機）?！拔覀?nèi)詴谴黉N型百貨商場”已經(jīng)成了甘內(nèi)特和投資者交流時的口頭禪。但他正在努力為大幅打折商品和他希望凸顯的知名大廠產(chǎn)品劃清界限。

初步跡象表明，梅西百貨已經(jīng)讓一些知名時尚品牌相信自己的折扣不會給他們帶來負面影響。一些強大品牌，比如服裝巨頭PVH旗下的Tommy Hilfiger和Calvin Klein，在梅西百貨的銷售額已經(jīng)開始反彈，這在一定程度上要歸功于更好的商品展示。甘內(nèi)特說梅西百貨可以為Michael Kors和Ralph Lauren做出類似的業(yè)績。類似的成功增多有可能消除廠家的疑慮，甚至有助于梅西百貨拿下新的熱門品牌。就像咨詢?nèi)耸啃粮袼f：“梅西百貨需要記住他們能把別人造就成王者?！?

今年秋季的一天，梅西百貨的投資者就有過成為王者的感覺——11月9日，該公司股價上漲了10%以上，原因是2017年前三季度凈利潤同比增長54%。梅西百貨披露，清倉商品減少，香水、女鞋和珠寶首飾銷售大幅上升。

不過，利潤上升的同時收入?yún)s在下降，而且這還不是唯一滑坡的指標。梅西百貨的實體店規(guī)模同樣驟減。到2018年底，該公司要關(guān)閉的商場數(shù)量將占2014年所經(jīng)營商場的20%。這家百貨連鎖已經(jīng)壓縮了一些商場的營業(yè)面積，并重新將部分商場賣給了General Growth等商場開發(fā)商。今年10月，梅西百貨賣掉了西雅圖市中心商場的最上面幾層，這幾乎是對該公司全面調(diào)整的最佳詮釋。入駐其中的則是亞馬遜。

梅西百貨甚至有可能面臨關(guān)閉更多店面的壓力。研究機構(gòu)Green Street Advisors今年1月估算，按坪效計算，只有40%的梅西百貨店鋪屬于“強大”商場；剩下的60%缺乏吸引力，客流不斷下降，商場里顯得特別空曠和冷清。而且正如最新盈利數(shù)據(jù)所凸顯的那樣，關(guān)掉業(yè)績欠佳的商場可以提高梅西百貨的利潤。

不過，甘內(nèi)特告訴《財富》雜志，梅西百貨目前的“商場數(shù)量基本合適”。他不愿意進一步削減規(guī)模的原因顯而易見。關(guān)閉店鋪會形成惡性循環(huán)——品牌知名度下降會影響附近店面的銷售，從而造成廠家降低這家零售商的優(yōu)先等級。雖然梅西百貨的電商業(yè)務很強，但總的來說它并未提振業(yè)績。梅西百貨表示，在關(guān)閉實體店的地區(qū)，在線業(yè)務或另一店鋪平均僅能保留12%的銷售額。SW Retail Advisors總裁韋德里茨說：“就那種[百分比]水平而言，我們并不需要梅西百貨?！?

店鋪難題反映了甘內(nèi)特面臨的挑戰(zhàn)。在他讓梅西百貨商場中的商品再次熠熠生輝的努力中，“以退為進”也許是主基調(diào)。但退的太多就，嗯，真的成了后退——急劇緊縮存在同時趕走消費者、品牌和投資者的可能。

甘內(nèi)特本人避開了那些更小、更集中對梅西百貨來說更好的言辭。相反，他把賭注押在店內(nèi)商品減少、價格上升以及電商業(yè)務增長將帶動收入反彈上。

甘內(nèi)特認為，零售行業(yè)全面洗牌將產(chǎn)生贏家和輸家。他說：“我們?yōu)槊肺靼儇浀谋P算是躋身勝利者行列?！钡O法面面俱到是一場很難取勝的戰(zhàn)斗，而2017年的艱難購物旺季假期有可能迫使梅西百貨縮短戰(zhàn)線。

本文將刊登在2017年12月1日出版的《財富》雜志上，題為《梅西百貨勝敗在此圣誕》（Macy’s Make-or-Break Christmas）。

If you want to know why Macy’s (M, +1.05%) needs to reinvent itself—why the department store ?giant wants to change, and why doing so will be so challenging—you could start by comparing two of the most recent circulars that the chain sent to shoppers.

One brochure is a snappy mini-catalog for the all-important holiday season, a centerpiece of a new marketing campaign. Called “Gifts We Love,” it features 125 items—a tiny, strategically chosen slice of the tens of thousands of products Macy’s sells. It uses lush, high-quality photography and elegant fonts to showcase offerings like a cozy Ugg robe and a $180 Star Wars drone. And there’s not a single mention of a discount, not one “Extra 40% Off” or “30%–75% Off Storewide” bubble to be found. If anything, the brochure looks like something a higher-end retailer, a Nordstrom or a Saks, might produce.

It also looks almost nothing like Macy’s previous circular, which came out just days earlier. That one touts canyon-deep discounts pegged to the end of daylight saving time—a flimsy excuse for a shopping event if ever there was one. (One such deal: 65% off Tommy Hilfiger sport coats.) The brochure looks cluttered, almost like a supermarket coupon mailer. It gives off a whiff of desperation.

“Gifts We Love” represents the future to which Macy’s aspires. It’s part of a far-reaching effort by the nation’s largest department store chain to regain its former mantle as a tastemaker among better brands at its 664 stores nationwide. The daylight saving discount-orama, meanwhile, represents the reality Macy’s is struggling to transcend—a circular firing squad where big retailers that offer very similar products can lure shoppers only by slashing their prices.

The Tale of Two Brochures epitomizes Macy’s long-standing identity crisis, and it’s one that the company needs to resolve soon. In November, the company, which also owns the 38-store Bloomingdale’s chain, posted its 11th consecutive quarter of declines in comparable or “same-store” sales, a metric that strips out results from recently opened or closed stores. Its stock is down more than 70% from its 2015 peak. The task of reversing this slide falls to Jeff Gennette, Macy’s CEO since March and a 34-year veteran of the company. This holiday season—during the gift-buying rush that generates about 30% of annual sales, and is the one and only time all year that some shoppers will visit a Macy’s store—the initiatives Gennette and his team are rolling out will face their first major test.

Gennette’s plan, dubbed “North Star” in a nod to Macy’s logo, leans heavily on the “Gifts We Love” approach, stressing the idea of Macy’s as not just a store but a retail “authority”—a favorite word of the imposing 56-year-old CEO. “Our customers really look to us for fashion curation and guidance, more so than to other retail brands,” Gennette tells Fortune. He wants to capitalize more fully on that clout with customers, in fashion, beauty, home goods, and even tech. That means de-emphasizing discounts and cutting clutter in stores, so that Macy’s can build a selective aura around hotter brand names that can draw more customers and sell at bigger profits.

There’s a catch, though: If Macy’s eliminates too many discounts, it risks chasing away the deal-hunting shoppers who account for much of its $25 billion in annual sales. In short, Gennette wants to burnish Macy’s tasteful patina while remaining what retailers call a “promotional store.” And threading that needle may prove to be as difficult as shimmying down a chimney flue with a sack full of toys.

It would be pollyannaish to believe that Macy’s will easily win its way back into shoppers’ good graces. The chain has been bleeding market share, losing ground to established retailers, including the almighty Amazon, and to ascendant digital-first companies like Stitch Fix and Revolve. Younger customers are staying away in droves. And in an ominous turn of events, big brands like Coach, Michael Kors, and Ralph Lauren have reduced the amount they sell through department stores, complaining that the industry’s culture of discounting has contaminated their brands. Even Nike, without naming names, recently said it had had enough of “mediocre” retailers and would rely more on its own stores and e-commerce site.

These are the fires that Gennette is racing to douse. Since taking the reins from longtime CEO and current executive chairman Terry Lundgren, he has won kudos from investors for his frankness about store clutter and shopper defections. “It’s been nice to hear Macy’s talk about reality rather than tell the Street what it wants to hear,” says Stacey Widlitz, president of consulting firm SW Retail Advisors. Gennette has led a reorganization of top management (the third in three years) that included poaching a top eBay executive, Hal Lawton, to be his second-in-command, and consolidated the retailer’s sprawling merchandising bureaucracy.

This holiday season, customers will start seeing North Star’s influence on the sales floor. Macy’s will set up displays at key spots in stores to highlight the “Gifts We Love”—supported and promoted by Macy’s small but increasingly important army of “My Stylist” personal shoppers. (After the holidays, Macy’s will continue to “curate” must-have items under a new “It List” rubric.) The chain is wooing higher-?spending customers, meanwhile, with a revamped loyalty program that lavishes the top 10% of its customers, people who spend an average of $1,200 a year, with more goodies like exclusive sales and beauty-salon pampering.

Close observers will spot other changes, too, as moves initiated years ago bear fruit. More Macy’s are selling beauty products in ways that borrow ideas from nimbler, fast-growing competitors like Ulta Beauty and Sephora. There are now 20 stores with a kiosk from -Bluemercury, the luxury beauty chain the company bought in 2015. And in more locations, clearance merchandise now dwells in segregated areas, called “Last Act,” intended to keep their deep discounts from sharing space with, or dimming the luster of, trendy brands that sell at full price.

Conventional wisdom holds that department stores can’t survive in the 21st century—and the woes of retailers from J.C. Penney to Sears to Dillard’s to the upscale Neiman Marcus reinforce that argument. But of its cohort, Macy’s arguably is the best equipped to pull through the current slump. It’s one of the few chains offering a mix of higher-end and mass-market merchandise, and it wields a formidable marketing and supply-chain apparatus. The company is also an e-commerce powerhouse, with $4.3 billion in annual sales, ranking it sixth nationwide. These strengths have helped Macy’s buy more time from investors and analysts, even as it struggles to figure out what comes next.

“It takes a long time to turn around a battleship, but they’re incredibly dangerous,” says Mortimer Singer, CEO of retail consultancy Marvin Traub Associates. Now the pressure is on Gennette to retrofit the U.S.S. Macy’s before changing consumer tastes capsize it.

Few retailers enjoy as prized a place in U.S. history as Macy’s. The retailer, opened in 1858 by Rowland H. Macy in New York City as a dry-goods store, became a cornerstone in many major American cities by the early 20th century, and its primacy in popular culture was cemented by the 1947 holiday movie classic, Miracle on 34th Street. The million-square-foot Macy’s flagship is among the five most visited tourist spots in New York, and its annual Fourth of July fireworks and Thanksgiving Day parade attract millions of TV viewers. Today, 41 million Americans shop at Macy’s at least once a year.

The company reached true retail-behemoth status under Terry Lundgren. Sales roughly doubled in the decade after Lundgren became CEO, hitting a peak of about $28 billion in 2014. Macy’s fueled that growth by getting ahead of its rivals in e-commerce, and by undertaking several major acquisitions, most notably its 2005 purchase of May Department Stores.

But the deals that made Macy’s the industry leader also sowed the seeds of its current problems. Macy’s management swelled to become a lumbering bureaucracy, slow to react to change. And as more buying decisions flowed from national headquarters rather than local management, its product offerings, particularly in clothing, converged with those of other department stores. That drew the company deeper into the lethal spiral of discounting: Macy’s and its rivals created a “sea of sameness” that left shoppers bored and forced the retailers to resort to discounts to lure them back. “They really took their eye off the ball in terms of how to be special for the customer,” says Steve Dennis, president of SageBerry Consulting and a former Sears and Neiman Marcus executive.

Today clothing is one of the categories where Macy’s is hurting most. Discounters like T.J. Maxx have been juggernauts, and the threat from Amazon.com, which is launching its own fashion brands as well as a subscription service called Amazon Prime Wardrobe, is only growing. Already, 47% of Macy’s clothes customers also shop for clothes on Amazon, according to Magid Retail Pulse. And Cowen & Co. is forecasting a new indignity: The Wall Street firm says Amazon will eclipse Macy’s as the top seller of apparel in the country this year, and that Amazon’s market share will be three times as big as Macy’s by 2021.

Gennette’s star rose just as Macy’s momentum began to run out. After five years as chief merchant—the executive in charge of deciding what Macy’s sells—he became president, and Lundgren’s heir apparent, in 2014. Gennette has been involved with multiple efforts to get the retailer back on track, efforts that underscore how much spaghetti Macy’s has thrown at the wall, and how little has stuck.

A case in point: Beauty products, which generate about 15% of department store visits, became a chronically weak spot for Macy’s about five years ago, as it ceded market share to the likes of Ulta and Sephora. One edge those boutiques brought to the battle was “open sell,” where customers can try out products without intervention from clerks. But Macy’s stayed wedded to the 1940s, products-behind-the-counter method of selling; only now, after years of sales erosion, is Macy’s testing “open sell” at 200 or so stores.

Macy’s also waffled in handling Backstage—its separate brand for selling discounted fashion. Originally conceived as a chain of outlet stores, its development was slow; as Lundgren admitted in 2015, “I didn’t really want this business.” Only after it became clear that shoppers were choosing discounters like T.J. Maxx and Marshalls over Macy’s did the company relent. It has now decided to bring the concept into its main stores, giving Backstage 25,000 square feet, or about 20% of the space of a typical store, at 45 locations, with hundreds more stores potentially getting one.

Stores with a Backstage section are seeing a seven-percentage-point improvement in sales year over year, according to Gennette. But valuable time and opportunities have been lost. “In the past they’ve talked about a lot of good initiatives,” says Neil Saunders, a managing director at GlobalData Retail. “Do they have the stamina and confidence to see them through?”

Tall and immaculately dressed, Gennette doesn’t seem to lack for confidence. And in conversations with Fortune this summer and fall, he reiterated that he was directing his energy toward smart, strategic cutting.

Some of the cuts focus on the supply chain. Gennette wants to use far fewer suppliers for Macy’s exclusive products. Those house brands, including INC apparel, now generate 29% of the company’s sales. As part of an effort to boost that to 40%, Gennette is cutting out two-fifths of those suppliers and requiring the remaining ones to set aside much of their capacity exclusively for Macy’s so it can speed up the time it takes to bring merchandise to market—essential to competing with “fast fashion” brands like Zara and H&M. For some items, Macy’s has shrunk the time from order to shelves from several months to eight weeks.

But the more important cutting is happening on sales floors, where Gennette is chipping away at Macy’s image as a bazaar that overflows with stuff people can find anywhere. “We know that we have too much clutter in our stores,” the CEO says. To fix that prestige-destroying problem, Macy’s is testing what Gennette calls “extreme editing” at a store in Woodbridge Township, N.J. Shoppers in that area skew “fashion forward” compared with Macy’s national average. So the store cut about 40% of the selection, rapidly eliminating items that were too similar, or that didn’t catch on, and replacing them with trendier fare. The average revenue generated by some key items is up 10% at the store, and Gennette tells Fortune he thinks he can replicate those results throughout the chain.

The Woodbridge test exemplifies the benefits Gennette wants to reap from a leaner inventory. In theory, it’ll lead to fewer items being sold on clearance, while creating a more visually pleasing store that looks more upscale. A smaller, easier-to-track inventory will enable faster, smoother e-commerce deliveries, transactions in which stores now play key roles.

Above all, Gennette sees smaller selections paying off in improved customer service. Rather than continually running between store floor and stockroom, clerks could build expertise in products like those on the “It List” and develop more of a rapport with customers. Right now Macy’s employs just 250 personal shoppers across 150 of its stores; in a leaner future, more of the rank-and-file could play a comparable role. Macy’s gets just under half its revenue from the top 10% of its customers, who have been visiting less often. Creating a sense of exclusivity and service could swell the ranks of those bigger spenders—and make them less likely to hold out for discounts.

Gennette knows he has to tread carefully. Unless you have products that other retailers don’t carry and that shoppers genuinely want, pulling back on discounts can be suicidal. (A similar move by J.C. Penney in 2012 led to plummeting sales and an enduring crisis.) “We’re going to remain a promotional department store” has become a mantra for Gennette in talks with investors. But he’s striving to draw a clear boundary between the sharply discounted deals and the products from the big, distinctive vendors he hopes to emphasize.

Early signs suggest that Macy’s has convinced some big names in fashion that its discounts no longer taint them. Stalwart brands like Tommy Hilfiger and Calvin Klein, both owned by apparel giant PVH, are enjoying a sales rebound at Macy’s, thanks in part to better presentation. Gennette says Macy’s could deliver similar results for Michael Kors and Ralph Lauren. More such wins could soothe vendors’ anxiety and even help Macy’s line up hot new brands. As consultant Singer puts it, “Macy’s needs to remember that they can be kingmakers.”

For one day this fall, Macy’s investors felt like kings. The stock jumped more than 10% on Nov. 9 on news that net income was up 54% year over year through the first three quarters of 2017. Macy’s reported that it was selling fewer items at clearance and seeing booming sales of fragrances, women’s footwear, and jewelry.

Still, the bump in profit coincided with continuing declines in revenues. And that isn’t the only metric that’s shrinking: Macy’s is also inexorably trimming its physical footprint. By the end of 2018, the chain will have closed 20% of the stores that it operated in 2014. The chain has shrunk space at some stores and sold others back to mall developers like General Growth. In a near-perfect metaphor for retail’s upheaval, Macy’s sold the top floors of its downtown Seattle location in October—and Amazon is moving in.

Nicolas Rapp

Macy’s will likely face pressure to close even more stores. According to a January tally by Green Street Advisors, only 40% of Macy’s stores are in “strong” malls as measured by sales per square foot; the other 60% are in the sorts of uninviting shopping centers where foot traffic is dwindling and department stores can feel especially vacant and gloomy. And as the company’s latest results underscore, shutting underperforming locations can boost profits.

Still, Gennette tells Fortune Macy’s is now at “about the right number of doors.” It’s easy to see why he’d resist culling the fleet further. Closing stores can create a vicious cycle in which reduced brand visibility hurts sales in nearby stores, and vendors stop giving that retailer priority. And while Macy’s e-commerce is strong, it doesn’t generally pick up the slack: The company says that in areas where it has closed a physical store, it holds on to an average of only 12% of its sales, either online or at another store. “That [percentage] says, ‘We don’t need Macy’s,’?” says Widlitz, the retail consultant.

The store conundrum is a metaphor for the challenges Gennette faces. “Less is more” may be a leitmotif in his efforts to restore luster to the products on Macy’s sales floor. But too much “l(fā)ess” is just, well, less—shrinking too drastically risks driving away customers, brands, and investors alike.

Gennette himself avoids language that suggests that Macy’s would be better off as a smaller, more focused retailer. Instead, he’s betting that with fewer products in stores, a combination of higher prices and continued growth in e-commerce will create a revenue rebound.

The way Gennette sees it, the big retail shakeout underway will have winners and losers. “We intend for Macy’s to be one of the winners,” he says. But trying to be all things to all people is a hard battle to win—and a tough holiday season in 2017 could force Macy’s to fight on fewer fronts.

A version of this article appears in the Dec. 1, 2017 issue of Fortune with the headline “Macy’s Make-or-Break Christmas.”