The National Retail Federation’s Shop.org is increasing its offerings at the regional level thanks to volunteer members who are organizing successful events for e-retailers.  Known for offering outstanding networking and programming at the national level throughout the year, the e-retailing association is giving members the opportunity to engage each other more frequently at the local level.  The afternoon and early-evening events… featuring cocktails and a well-prepared yet casual dinner… are being organized in Dallas, New York, Chicago and San Francisco. 

“Shop.org regional events give our members an opportunity to gather with local fellow retailers in between national events, thus increasing the frequency of information sharing opportunities and without the travel costs,” Scott Silverman recently told me.

Members are coming together to network and gain insights on important industry issues and practices such as search, affiliate marketing, click fraud/PPC advertising and emerging technologies like RSS.  As usual, Shop.org’s popular (read: successful) retailer-only roundtables are back and feature open and honest dialogue between members.  Essentially, it’s “retailers helping retailers” and from what I have experienced it’s not surprising that members enjoy this feature. 

As an example, the San Francisco event focused one of its roundtables on eHoliday merchandising and marketing.  Here in Chicago, Crate & Barrel provided our group with fantastic facilities (including a tour).  Thanks go out to C&B’s fearless e-commerce leader, John Seebeck and Gordon Segal, CEO and Co-Founder of the company.