You don't exactly hear from Burt Flickinger. He radios in. Usually you can feel the clack-clack of a train or the hermetic compression of an airplane cabin as he downloads the latest.

The top 25 retailers control about 60% of the retail sales volume in the world and account for about 20% of spending on consumer marketing. That's going to grow geometrically. If you look at the top 25 retailers, 16 or 17 of the top 25 are either U.S. headquartered or concentrate significant decision-making in the United States. That means that the U.S., led by Wal-Mart, is going to have a significant influence on global retail.

This is almost like Yogi Bera's "deja vu all over again." Sixty years ago -- pre- World War II -- every one of the major industrialized nations had a colonial empire. Now every one of those same nations has a colonial empire -- only it's retailing instead of a military-industrial complex. Japan is a global exporter of retailing. France is the biggest global exporter of retailing in Europe, followed closely by the Germans, and then the English. Australia exports global retailing. The U.S. has its own colonial empire, led by Wal-Mart.

We are trying to get retailers around the country to put healing, recovery and spirituality centers in their stores for children and women who have been sexually and physically abused, are victims of domestic violence and substance abuse.

With the exception of some players in Spain and Portugal that also had their own colonial empires pre-World War II, the list stops there. So you've got players in seven major industrialized countries controlling about 70% of the international chain business.

I've spoken with the CEO's and CFOs of most of the major players in Japan and Asia, Europe and North America in the last eight months. Without exception, all of them have their checkbooks out. Rather than building new stores, they want to acquire chains in other countries because that's the fastest way to grow and export their global retailing.

One of the things driving globalization is that in each country, particularly France and Germany, legislation has been passed in the last year that says you can't build new stores, or you can't build big-box stores. Everybody is racing to acquire other chains in their own countries and then acquire chains that have operations internationally.

It's Wal-mart, versus the major players in Germany -- Makro, Metro Kauhof, Horton and Haub-Tengelmann -- to see who is going to control retailing in Germany. In France it's who's going to get bought next because major players in France -- Promodes, Carrefour, Pepe Le Peu -- are all exporting retailing really aggressively. In England, where you can't get 7-12 acre sites to build, a lot of the chains are going international. J. Sainsbury and Marks & Spencer are both looking overseas for growth. In Japan, the globalization trend is even more pronounced than in the U.K. There's no available land, so Justco, et. al., are all going overseas to grow.

A lot of the growth, surprisingly, is being funded by the Philip Morrises and the Frito-Lays and the P&G's. That's because they have to figure out how to market to the consumer in Beijing versus Shanghai or Macao, where one group speaks Cantonese, while another speaks Mandarin. There are all of these cultural nuances that U.S. packaged goods marketers don't understand.

These manufacturers have figured out that the retail chain can be the conduit to the consumer. If P&G wants to beat Frito globally, they have to become number one in about twelve, major industrialized countries that are politically stable. To do that, there are about 15 global retailers for which they need to become the preferred suppliers. They have calculated that they can have the retail trade there to protect them versus their competitors in their race to get to the consumer first.

It's really hard to get retailers and manufacturers to get behind spirituality sections in their stores because no one wants to touch rape, incest, domestic violence, child and sexual abuse and substance abuse. But somebody needs to take a stand.

P&G is being very effective that way. Frito-Lay is now trying to borrow and build on that Px strategy. Unilever and Nestle are also looking for global alliances. The manufacturers that are going to win with Wal-Mart are those that are ready to help them be more successful as a global retailer. Wal-Mart, as a global retailer, will help manufacturers be better marketers in countries where they want to extend their brand franchises.

The second tier of international retailers that's emerging is probably going to be one of the major drug chains. It will be probably either CVS or Walgreens starting in Europe, possibly Rite-Aid. And then the other tier of great international retailing is going to be done in the hardlines consumer durable goods category with Home Depot going international, and Staples and Office Depot taking office specialty retail international. Price/Costco is also a great international retailer. Toys R Us is a great international retailer.

The supermarket retailers with U.S. operations that are also worldwide include Ahold -- which is the whole Stop & Shop, Edwards, Tops, Bi-Lo, Giant, Pathmark, BKwik, Wilson Farms -- will be the number one supermarket or food retailer worldwide with significant operations in every major continent with the exception of Africa and Australia. The other retailers that are U.S. based with strong worldwide operations are Food Lion, through their International parent, Delhaize, in Belgium and Kings, in New Jersey, through their parent Marks & Spencer, as well as Shaw's and Star Market, through their parent, J. Sainsbury. in the U.K.

Globalization also has major implications for the development of retailer store brands. Overall, you have a bi-polar split, in that European retailers, led by the retailers in the U.K., are brilliant brand marketers, whereas the retailers in Asia are not good marketers. Then you have a bi-border split in North America, where the Canadians are really becoming excellent brand marketers at retail and the Americans and Mexicans are not.

Over the years I worked with a lot of jazz legends -- Duke Ellington, Count Basie, Lionel Hampton. As a group they were the nicest, most soulful and spiritual people that I ever met. But the people on the business side of music were the most dishonest, dirty dogs I ever met.

Most of the major retailers headquartered in the U.K. will invest at least $50 million (U.S.) in research and development to create completely unique brands. Maybe apparel brands, maybe consumables. In addition to spending $50 million in Rx, each retailer will spend anywhere from $24-$50 million in consumer communication and really drive those brands. The development of those brands will go all the way down to retail. Canadians borrowed and built on that model.

In the U.S., at least in the consumable industry, there used to be legislation that my great-grandfather and grandfather developed when A&P was complaining that they were the only ones who should be allowed to have national brands. This was an FTC guideline stipulating that each retailer on the consumable side would be able to have its own brand but that a minimum of 3% would have to be spent on marketing that brand directly to the consumer.

In the last few years, most of the retailers have gotten around that FTC guideline and have put together in-house marketing and buying groups. They've taken that 3% and dropped it directly to the bottom line. They have close to zero marketing in consumer advertising spending on private brands.

Because the retailers in the U.S. are so greedy, outside of the apparel channel, they haven't done anything to build the consumable side of the business. There have been exceptions, but the exceptions have really been based on the Canadian model. So, President's Choice has been a big success in the U.S., but it came out of Western Loblaw Group in Canada.

More recently, Ahold decided to drop President's Choice in the balance of their stores. That's nuts, because they're replacing it with Sensational. I've spoken with people who have Sensational in their stores and they say, correctly, that the packaging is poor -- the content is good but the presentation is not sensational. There's no advertising. There's no identification with the store, or with a premium or super-premium consumer segment.

In creating their own brands -- Gap excepted -- Americans continue to make mistake after mistake and are too insipid to study the globe to identify best practices in developing retail brands. So, in the absence of knowledge and learning and applying principles that have worked elsewhere, retail brands will continue to be sold on a lowest common denominator brand in the U.S. That's the retailer's tragic flaw and the branded manufacturer's built-in advantage in the short term.

I dedicate all my presentations to Dr. Wendell Earle of Cornell because he convinced me to stay out of the music business and give marketing and retailing a shot instead. He was a huge influence on me.

Retail globalization unfortunately is going to catalyze a record number of bankruptcies, both on U.S. and on foreign soil. You'll see a whole series of filings in most major channels. The problem is they can't compete, don't have the money to reinvest in assortment and in developing stores that consumers want to shop in.

Just in the mass channel alone, five of the top ten have already gone through bankruptcy proceedings again. It's almost like the toy channel, where two of the top three had to file a couple of times. That's what's going to happen in the mass channel. In the supermarket channel you'll see record-setting numbers of bankruptcies both on the chain and wholesale sides.

Ultimately, it's almost planned obsolescence -- two generations of bad management, maximizing personal bonuses and not reinvesting in the business. They're competing against Wal-Mart, which is constantly reinvesting in the business. Unfortunately, a lot of major retailers won't be left standing.