BECOMING A MEMBER OF RAM IS ONE OF THE BEST DECISIONS YOU CAN MAKE FOR YOUR BUSINESS.
By joining you gain access to exclusive, money saving discounts on services and programs, legislative updates and advocacy as well as valuable educational opportunities. We aim to help you grow and protect your business, promote the retail industry and save your business money. Click here to JOIN NOW!
The Retail Doctor: Bob Phibbs
to Keynote RAMAE Awards Luncheon
Bob Phibbs, The Retail Doctor, will join us as our keynote speaker at the Annual Meeting & RAM Awards of Excellence luncheon. The event will take place on November 18, 2026 at the Conference Center at Bentley University in Waltham. During his keynote presentation, you'll discover how to engage your customers, make bigger sales, and earn the profits you seek. You'll be inspired to upgrade the way you do business. Bob will provide insight into: creative ways to reinvent your customer experience; how to increase your value through people, not price; and how to attract and train employees.
For more information and to register for the luncheon, click here.
Bob Phibbs, known as the Retail Doctor, has spent more than thirty years helping retailers, manufacturers, and hospitality brands sell more. He founded The Retail Doctor in 1994 after rising from the sales floor to corporate officer, franchisor, and entrepreneur.
His client roster includes LEGO, Hunter Douglas, Vera Bradley, OMEGA, Yamaha, Brother, and Caswell-Massey. Before consulting full-time, he served as Chief Operating Officer and Chief Marketing Officer of It's A Grind Coffee, which grew past 125 franchised locations and twice ranked as the second-fastest-growing company in Los Angeles County. In one early turnaround, he helped an independent coffeehouse beat back Starbucks, lifting sales 50 percent in a year.
Bob wrote You Can Compete and The Retail Doctor's Guide to Growing Your Business, published by Wiley. His work has appeared in the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times, and Entrepreneur, and he has been featured on MSNBC and Fox. He is a member of the National Speakers Association.
Today he trains sales teams, keynotes retail conferences worldwide, and shows brick-and-mortar stores how to turn browsers into buyers. Visit him at RetailDoc.com.
MA Lawmakers Conclude Formal Session:
Under New Rules, Likely to Return with Major Votes this Fall
The MA House and Senate adjourned at 11:30 PM on July 31st, ending formal session for this legislative cycle – sort of. The last day of July in even numbered years has historically been a busy and chaotic day on Beacon Hill. However, thanks to a Joint Rules change adopted last year, legislators now have additional time to resolve major differences in pending legislation.
Under the old rules, formal session ended on July 31, and the Legislature would continue to meet in informal session until the end of the year, where typically only non-controversial matters could be handled, with no roll call votes taken and the objection of any one member could block the further progress of any bill. Under the new rules, July 31 was still an important deadline (signaling the end of the road for most legislation left undone), but the Legislature may now still meet in formal session after July 31 in the second year of the session to take up reports of conference committees formed on or before July 31st, appropriation bills filed after July 31st, and gubernatorial vetoes or amendments.
Most of the priority issues RAM has been engaged in, and continues to work on, did all make it into conference committee. The resolution of those issues will be subject to continued negotiations this fall.
Click here to keep reading which bills having passed both branches and are still pending before conference committees.
Consumer Data Privacy: The Need for a Balanced Approach
blog post by Ryan Kearney
The success and sustainability of any retail business depends on the establishment of long-term customer relationships. Such relationships are built by providing positive customer experiences as well as earning and maintaining the customer’s trust. The collection and utilization of information provided by consumers, and the manner in which the retailer treats such information within its possession play a key role in both aspects of such relationship building.
The collection of consumer data is therefore an essential part of any retail business. It is necessary for the completion of sales transactions, deliveries, and returns, for the detection of fraud, and for the administration of consumer loyalty and discount pricing programs. In each instance, data provided by the consumer allows for more efficient business operations and a more positive customer experience.
Click here to keep reading.
Learn about RAM’s Retirement Plan Options
There has never been a better time to start a retirement plan! The federal government recognizes citizens have not saved nearly enough to produce a comfortable retirement and have recently rolled out tremendous TAX CREDITS to help employers provide access to retirement savings vehicles, like 40lk's.
With the passage of Secure Act legislation in other states, more employers are gaining access and seeing advantages in the pooled plan space. These arrangements are providing unique opportunities for employers to reduce the amount of time they are spending on plan administration & simultaneously save SIGNIFICANTLY on the costs they are spending on their current 401(k) plan.
RAM wants to help provide these advantages to you! We have rolled out a Multiple Employer 401(k) Plan to simplify the process of offering a 401(k) plan to your employees. Standard single 401(k) plans have been around for a long time. Our goal is to provide a powerful alternative for members that want to decrease the amount of time they spend on administration, remove fiduciary liability, eliminate the costly annual 401(k) audit, and lower costs.
Please join us for a webinar on September 24th at noon to learn more about these TAX CREDITS and the advantages of our Multiple Employer 401k Plan. Watch your email for registration link.
Small Businesses are drowning in hidden energy costs
RAMHIC Offerings for 2026
RAMHIC continues to partner with Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts to offer members access to the carrier's entire portfolio of high quality, small group health insurance plans.
All members purchasing their health insurance coverage through the cooperative will also receive an expanded list of ancillary benefits, FREE of charge.
Please see our brochure for more detail on the expanded benefit package. Specific information regarding each benefit may be found below: For more information please visit the RAMHIC page of our website.
By Jeffrey Gold, MD & Jon Hurst
April 2026 marks the 20th anniversary of the Massachusetts Health Care reform law, Chapter 58, which became the model for the Affordable Care Act. The goal of the law was to expand access to health insurance coverage for all residents, address uncompensated care and build transparency tools to better understand affordability.
While some may want to celebrate Chapter 58, many remain concerned about a health care system that is among the most expensive in the nation. Twenty years of paying for near universal health coverage is taking a toll on taxpayers, businesses and families.
To keep reading this blog post, click here.
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