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George Whalin's experience in retail is extensive and first hand. He started his career on the sales floor and worked his way up. In the 1960s, he opened and managed the original Guitar Center on Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood, California. He sold instruments to the Beatles, Rolling Stones, Jackson Five, Grateful Dead, and many more well-known and not-so-wellknown musicians. After leaving the musical instrument business he became the senior training manager for a 125-store consumer electronics chain.

In 1987, George founded Retail Management Consultants, which provides business-building services to retail companies and industry suppliers all across North America. He has worked with a wide range of companies in every area of retailing from single-store merchants to leading national chains. His clients also include retail trade associations; buying groups; franchise organizations; and some of the world's best-known consumer products manufacturers, distributors, and suppliers.

His book, Retail Success! Increase Sales, Maximize Profits, and Wow Your Customers in the Most Competitive Marketplace in History is now in its eighth printing and is used as supplemental reading in several university retailing courses. He writes the monthly Retail Management E-Letter, an online newsletter with subscribers all around the world. As one of the nation's most highly respected retail experts, George is regularly quoted in USA Today, The Wall Street Journal, Business Week, US News & World Report, CNNMoney, Oprah Magazine, and numerous trade magazines as well as newspapers across the country. He's a regular guest on radio and TV newscasts commenting about current retail and consumer issues.

George is a highly sought after speaker, each year delivering speeches and seminars for retail companies, associations, and consumer products manufacturers and suppliers all across North America as well as internationally. Rather than "off-the-shelf" presentations, every presentation is tailored to the industry segment and can be totally customized to fit your organization's goals and objectives.

His presentations are information-packed, exciting, entertaining, humorous, and motivational. But his top priority every time he speaks is to give audiences innovative ideas as well as practical, hardhitting strategies and no-nonsense tools they can put to use right away to build their businesses, sell more merchandise, and better serve today's savvy consumers.

As a "student" of retail George visits thousands of stores every year talking with front-line employees, store managers, owners, and customers. This in-store research gives him a unique perspective on retailing, stores, and consumers that he passes along to his audiences and readers. George has a passion for retail and everything he does from consulting to speaking to writing reflects that passion.

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