Retail in the Age of the Internet
26th January 2012
Almost certainly, you, too are ordering more and more of your merchandise via an online retailer. There’s nothing wrong with that, of course. But it gets a little sketchy when you start visiting big box retailers like Best Buy and Target so that you can have a look at the goods–and then place your order on Amazon.com.
There’s nothing sketchy about it at all. It’s called ‘competition’. We do that in America. As it happens, I have a Target just down the street, and I shop there all the time — especially now that they carry essential groceries and produce. I don’t shop at Best Buy because every time I have I was most impressed by how indifferent their salespeople were to customers.
Since it’s probably a lot cheaper to sell over the internet than to pay for prime real estate and employees to walk you through all the features, it’s hard to see how the brick-and-mortars can compete with see-it-here, buy-it-there.