Congratulations to Global Furnishings, winners of the third annual Intercollegiate Retail Challenge hosted by NRF Foundation and American Express.  During this year’s challenge, students evaluated the risks and rewards of expanding operations of a well established, modestly-priced furniture store into China in order to test how the company’s brand and product line would be received.

As part of their prize, the winners will head to NYC next weekend to deliver their presentation to attendees at NRF’s Big Show! The team was led by Melinda Burke of the Terry J. Lundgren Center for Retailing at the University of Arizona and is made up of students representing six universities as follows:

• Gentry Adams, Senior, University of Florida
• Kira Martin, Senior, Florida State University
• Anna Rhodes, Georgia Southern University
• Elena Brick, Senior, University of Wisconsin
• Aysha Majeed, University of Michigan
• Natalie Bendroff, University of Arizona

All of the student teams were able to demonstrate leadership and teamwork by working across multiple time zones and under tight deadlines to develop their presentations.  Many thanks to the judges and mentors for their support during this valuable activity as the students were able to expand their knowledge about retail careers through your participation.

In an exciting new addition to the program, American Express and NRF Foundation welcomed Sponsoring Retail Partners to this year’s challenge. JCPenney, Macy’s, Sears Holding Corporation, Toys “R” Us and NRF division, Shop.org, provided a combination of judges, mentors and generous scholarships to the six winning students. The companies’ enthusiasm for this project is very rewarding and greatly appreciated.

The aspire2retail Intercollegiate Retail Challenge helps build awareness of diverse career paths in retail by engaging university students in a competitive, collaborative role play with support from executive retail mentors to implement a multi-tiered business strategy.

For more information on this year’s challenge scenario, participating universities, and the retail mentors and judges, visit our Student Challenge webpage.

Congratulations to all!