the industry remains relatively unconsolidated, with fully 67 firms enjoying annual revenues of $100 million or more. Although, as will be discussed below, substantial consolidation activity is now taking place in the mail-order industry, the nature of the industry is likely to preclude a great degree of consolidation. The great strength of this industry is its ability to closely target specialized markets, and few firms will be able to gain synergy in selling to a variety of unrelated specialty customers.
The industry sells a very wide range of product lines. Among consumer catalogues, the Bruce, Dean study identified twelve distinct categories (in addition to "other"), of which the largest three -- gifts, apparel, and household -- accounted for less than half of the total catalogues. Of business-to-business catalogues, five main categories were identified, but the "other" category accounted for 23 percent of catalogues, equal to the percentage for the largest identified class, office products (Bruce, Dean, 1995, pp. 8-9).
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