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Retail trade is moving faster than ever.
While much has been said about how online shopping is changing the retail landscape, forcing traditional malls like malls to close, it is only now that the future of industry is starting to take off.
And yes, it's digital, as promised.
Amazon and, more recently, Nike, have launched their store concepts that put their digital intelligence at the center of their concerns, as they offer new experiences to their customers.
Nike lives out loud
Nike uses online shopping data to inform products stored in its new store, which opened in July.
It's the first Nike Live concept store, which aims to maximize speed and convenience by combining digital offerings with a 4,000-square-foot physical outlet.
Named Nike by Melrose, the store is a representation of local favorites – in this case, the west Hollywood part of Los Angeles. Much of this information has been gathered from customers using Nike's online services, whether they shop at Nike.com or that they are members of Nike Plus.
For example, customers based in Los Angeles buy a lot of Nike Cortez, a retro-style bass sneaker. Nike knows this by observing its buying habits and can therefore store more shoes in more colors and highlight them.
The store offers products in categories such as lifestyle and running, which are two of Nike's most popular products. Its main purpose is to serve customers who care about their style and fitness. The store offers products for men and women, but allows variations according to the preferred styles of each sex.
This marriage of digital prowess and physical experience in stores is the hallmark of Nike Live stores.
"That's a lot more the way consumers think about shopping – they do not put the physical and digital wall between the walls," said Heidi O'Neill, president of Nike's direct selling business, at Business Insider, during a visit to the new store shortly after it opens.
Customers can also use the Nike retail application to scan product barcodes and get more information about them, including the store's sizes and colors in stock.
Nike also adds convenient features such as street curbside pickup and digital bookings in lockers that customers can open with their phones.
With Nike Live, the company will have what you want, where you want it – and it will help you get it with the least amount of friction possible.
Future Nike stores, such as flagship stores expected to open this fall in New York and Shanghai, will incorporate elements of Nike Live, said CEO Mark Parker at the company's earnings call this week.
Amazon Go creates a new "magical" experience
Amazon opened its first Go Cashierless store in late January.
The store has technology "Just out out" of Amazon, which uses sensors and cameras to track what customers remove and exit the store. Located in Seattle, near the campus of Amazon, it is considered by many to be the future of retail, with a complex technology designed to make in-store purchases as easy and easy as shopping on Amazon. com.
In the absence of lines or payment process, the store uses cameras and sensors to track what you put in your cart. It then charges you through your Amazon account.
The store opened to the public Jan. 22 after a long beta period. The opening of the store has aroused a lot of interest from the locals and lines have formed quickly on the day of opening.
In a letter to investors, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos said he is proud to hear customers describe the "magical" shopping experience in the new store.
Amazon has since expanded its Go footprint to four sites, three to Seattle and one to Chicago, and others are en route to cities like New York and San Francisco.
The company could have an even more ambitious plan to develop Amazon Go. It wants to open at least 10 stores by the end of the year, then 50 in 2019, then eventually a rapid expansion of 3,000 stores. Here 2021, said Bloomberg, citing knowledgeable people.
Brick and mortar stores change forever
Together, Nike Live and Amazon Go are charting a new path for retail, no longer hindered by what was before, and offering new opportunities to deliver products to customers more effectively than ever before.
The advent of technology-driven physical stores proves that physical retail is not going anywhere.
"The physical retail business is clearly not dead," retail consultant Steve Dennis said in an article posted on the Forbes blog. "Far from it, actually, but to be sure, the boring, undifferentiated, irrelevant and flawless stores are definitely dead."
In fact, what is happening now is what Deloitte calls a "retail renaissance" fueled by new technologies and data-centric information about customer habits and characteristics.
"A radical change is taking place in the retail market – but this is not the apocalypse of the retail business." In our opinion, it is rather a rebirth – driven by enormous changes in the economy, competition and consumer access to options, all fueled by exponential, technological advances. " Deloitte writes in a March 2018 research report. "And in this renaissance, the winners seem to be the retailers who can capitalize on consumers' experience of their economic well-being – or lack thereof – in order to come up with a proposal. value that matches the needs of consumers. "
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