Retail (comic strip)

Retail is a syndicated comic strip distributed by King Features Syndicate. It was authored and illustrated by Norm Feuti. It ran in newspapers from 2006 to 2020, and throughout its run gained quickly in popularity following articles in The New York Times and TIME Magazine. In January 2020, Feuti announced that he planned to end the strip in order to focus on his career as a children's book author. The last strip was published on February 23, 2020.

The strip is set in store #4743 of a fictional department store chain called "Grumbel's." Grumbel's provides a wide array of goods; customers have been shown shopping for anything from garden equipment and electronics to clothing and housewares. Given the wide variety of products available through Grumbel's it more closely resembles a Sears than other types of retail stores. However, the name Grumbel's is a parody of real life department store Gimbels, which closed in 1987. It also suggests the word "grumble."

Besides being in a generic, suburban mall the location of Grumbel's was initially kept ambiguous. Grumbel's has been operating at least since the mid-1900s and was founded by the fictional J.P. Grumbel, as seen in one of the comic strips. January 10, 2010, it was revealed that this Grumbel's store is located in New England.

Following years of declining sales under incompetent senior executive management and many store closures because of pandemic, Grumbels filed for bankruptcy in January 2020, leading to the events at the end the strip.

First Appearance: January 1, 2006

Marla, a brunette woman in her late 30s, is originally Grumbel's assistant manager, later store manager, and the main character of the strip. She is good at her job and cited as a reasonable manager, but is often discouraged when the bureaucratic rules set by the corporate office work against the store's stated goal of customer service. While the daily strips' plots often deal with her discouragement, Marla maintains an optimistic attitude and often mentions a dream of opening her own small store or boutique. She vents her frustration by writing a retail manifesto railing against the idiocies of customers and management, which at last mention had grown to 200 pages. She made plans to start her own retail business, but was determined to keep this secret at work for fear of being fired by the management. However, Marla put this ambition on hiatus to support her young daughter and family.

Marla and her fiancé Scott were married in June 2011. Their first child, a daughter named Fiona Jane Garrison was born on April 9, 2012. Marla was promoted to store manager in March 2012 after Stuart accepted a promotion to district manager.

At the end of the strip, Marla is seen accepting a position as an office manager for a company named Myers-Peterson. With that secure, Marla called over Stuart to tender her immediate resignation with a recommendation that Crystal replace her for the liquidation. Marla also informed Stuart that she had already advised Crystal about appropriate pay demands and that most of the store staff had already resigned.