The David F. Miller Center
for Retailing Education and Research

The David F. Miller Center for Retailing Education and Research is hosting a 3-day tour of New York City with 15 Executives from China. The Executives work for the Beijing Modern Plaza, an upscale department store.

Not quite...This spring, The Retail Society travelled to The Villages, Florida to catch a glimpse of the lives of over 70,000 happily retired individuals.

Sylvia Borek, one of Warrington's top students, recently won first place in the 2nd Annual ACRA (AmericCollegiate Retailing Association) Charrette in Toronto, Canada.

The Retail Society was awarded Service Project of the Year at the 3rd Annual Undergraduate Awards Ceremony on April 15, 2008. Retail Society President, Michelle Rossi, accepted the award on behalf of the organization. This award marks the first for The Retail Society since they were founded in 2006. The service project, which took place during the Fall semester, was titled "Build-A-Bear, Make a Smile." Build-A-Bear Workshops donated 20 bears to the Society and a bear-making party took place in November. In December, a group of students travelled to Shands Hospital to bring some smiles and cheer to the children of the Pediatric ICU in the Congenital Heart Center. With the help of Build-A-Bear, this project will continue in Fall semesters to come and allow The Retail Society to reach out to other children around the University of Florida community.

An honors graduate of UF's Levin College of Law, David Berg began his retail career with Best Buy in 2002. Since joining Best Buy, Berg has advanced rapidly through the ranks and is now the new Executive V.P. of International Strategy and Corporate Development. Rising from Senior V.P. and C.O.O. of Best Buy International, Berg will now shift to identifying new geographic opportunities around the world following the success of Best Buy in China.

This course offers opportunities for working on real retail/marketing programs as interacting retail clients. The course is designed for students who want to have practical but insightful experiences in retail/marketing.

The retail market in India, one of the largest in the world, is going through an exciting transformation from a collection of small local retail outlets to the development of large national chains. To succeed in this evolving environment, Indian retailers need to develop high quality employees and managers. The Miller Center for Retailing Education and Research (CRER) at UF is partnering with Indian Institute of Retail Training (IIRT) to develop training programs for people who aspire to be involved in this new retail environment.

In addition to designing the curriculum, CRER is providing tools to assess the knowledge, skill, and abilities of the participants in the programs and awarding a certificate of accomplishment to the qualifying graduates.