With all the spending on advertising and marketing to drive prospects to point of purchase, I was recently amazed at several big-name retailers complete failure to follow the first rule of shopping: be easy to find.

Yes, these folks (ok: Safeway, Albertson’s, and Whole Foods grocery) had gone to great lengths to buy key locations near high-traffic areas, spent on weekly circulars, had large outdoor signage… and yet, when I went to their websites, they’d buried the “Store Locator” link.

Worse, Whole Foods didn’t even have a “search” function. They expected me to wade through their 50+ alphabetically listed California city names. I have no idea what’s near me.

They’re not alone! Some quick searching turned up similar problems at Home Depot, Target, and Officemax.

Is it a conspiracy? Or am I missing something? I mean, my memory of cost accounting says “if you have a fixed asset, maximize utilization” – or, put differently, if your physical stores are sitting there with the lights on, costing you rent and employee time, you should pack ‘em full of possible customers, to the extent possible without raising your fixed costs (eg having to hire more employees / expand the store / etc).

In addition, I was under the impression that people visiting a store were far more captive and committed to buy than people visiting a web site. I mean, I can zip through price comparisons on web sites in minutes – but once I park and enter a store, I’ll shell out the extra $5 just so I don’t have to visit another store (and that’s assuming I know I’m not getting a good deal!)

So folks, am I missing something? Or is this just another example of marketers blindly following their web designers (“hey, website space on the home page is precious, we’re comped by how much we sell online not at the store, let’s give the brick & mortar gang the shaft”)?

I think it’s stupid marketing. But I can’t tell. You make the call. Or visit the store. If you can find it…

[ps: Please buy my book. http://buynow.stupidmarketing.com -- and tell your friends!]