Article at a glance:

The e-tailer's secret weapon

Off-line retailing may be a mature, slow-growth business, but the on-line retail market is growing at double-digit rates. Nonetheless, these gains have yet to bring profits for most general retailers. The reason? Most of them are struggling to provide the depth of inventory and the rich and relevant on-line product information that customers expect on the World Wide Web. But help is at hand from category managers—wholesalers that merchandise and provide product information for on- and off-line inventories of a wide range of products.

The take-away

Category managers help general retailers offer a much broader selection, so that they can capture a higher proportion of their customers' on-line spending.