There are a lot of fundamental changes going on with retail shopping. One fundamental changes is that now more people buy online than from mail order catalogs. I would expect this trend will continue. Another fundamental change is that traditional brick-and-mortar stores are starting to use eCommerce tools and multi-channel marketing to compete with online catalog stores.
CircuitCity is a good example of a traditional catalog retailer using eCommerce tools to increase market share. Circuit City already has a service where you can order online and pick-up in your local store. This saves on possible shipping charges, delays in shipping, and minimizing time customer has to be in the store. Also, CircuitCity is looking at issuing headphones to customers to assist with in-store purchasing decisions. While in a CircuitCity store, customers can listen to “online” specials and also speak to online customer service representatives to help them with their purchase decision. Retailers may get burned by this technology when a comparison shopping site offers the same service over a cell phone. Shoppers could then be in one store and get price quotes and product comparisons from another store.
TechDirt posts: Internet Killed The Catalog Star. Catalogs are dead! Long live the catalog! A recent study reports that the growth in online shopping coincides closely with a decline in catalog shopping. Online shopping satisfies many of the same needs catalog shopping addresses, and does so in a more efficient, better way. The decline of catalog shopping is not surprising; the nature of catalog retail is changing. After finding that a single channel retail strategy is limiting, traditional catalog retailers are moving online, brick-and-mortar retailers are integrating their offline business tightly with their online, and web-only merchants are dabbling in catalog. Today’s consumers expect to be able to leaf through a catalog, go touch and feel the goods at the store, and then go home and order online — retailers are beginning to understand this fact, which is a good thing.
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