How Brick-and-Mortar Stores are re-gaining their mojo?

With the eCommerce and online retail stores gaining in popularity over the years, the general perception is that the brick and mortar stores are dying a natural death. Is it so? On the contrary, it can surprise you that these offline retailers are making a strong bid to share the growth stage with the eCommerce giants. We shall discuss some strategies that the brick and mortar retail business entities are adopting and making the lines blur between online and offline retail.

Omnichannel Retailing Practices

Omnichannel retailing is a multiple channel approach to sales seeking to provide customers with a seamless shopping experience irrespective of whether they are shopping online using a desktop, laptop, mobile, by telephone, or physically in a brick and mortar store.

What makes online shopping more attractive than offline shopping?

· The convenience of shopping is a vital factor that influences people to buy online. They can order their requirement from the confines of the homes and get the delivery of the items at their respective places.

· Online retailers do not have to invest much in storing stocks. Hence, they can offer the items at a discount. These discount offers are the driving force behind the success of online sales.

· Making payment is also easy online. However, that is not a distinctive feature as you can use similar methods of payment while purchasing offline as well.

How can you merge the experience of online and offline shopping?

When you talk of online retailing, the names such as Amazon and Alibaba come to mind immediately. Similarly, Walmart is the undisputed giant as far as the brick and mortar shopping is concerned. Each of these shopping techniques has its merits and demerits. These techniques are different, but Walmart has engaged in a strategy that aims to merge these two distinct experiences.

The Pickup Tower Strategy

Walmart has introduced this strategy where customers can order their goods online and pick them up from the Walmart store at a later date. The system is easy to use.

Credit: blog.walmart.com

Walmart is planning to have more than 700 pickup towers by the end of the year. Brick and mortar giants like Walmart benefit more from such initiatives because they do not have to invest anything. They can use the existing infrastructure to provide these additional services. Statistics show that the Walmart same-store sales grew at the fastest pace in the last ten years as the sales increased by nearly 4.5% during the second quarter.

The success story of Oasis

Oasis is a reputed fashion retailer in the UK. They have embarked on a novel approach to fuse their eCommerce site, mobile app, and the brick and mortar stores into a simple but enjoyable shopping experience.

Photo Credit: Retail Design Blog

As you walk into their stores, you will find many sales executives armed with iPads in their hands. These devices give you on-the-spot and accurate information about the products available in the store. Also, the iPad acts as a cash register whereby you can pay for the items you purchase from anywhere in the store. The benefit is that the staff can immediately place an order online if a particular item is not immediately available and arrange to ship it to your home. Customers can also download the Oasis app to supplement their in-store shopping experiences.

Cashier-less Go-Store experiment of Amazon

Photo Credit: www.eater.com

Amazon has introduced the novel concept of the cashier-less stores, the Go-Store, where Amazon customers can shop and checkout without interacting with any human employee of the kiosk. Amazon has opened the first such store in Seattle and plans to have more than 3000 such convenience stores by the year 2021.

Other Omnichannel initiatives

Sephora, the world’s No. 1 beauty retailer, has introduced services like Pantone Color IQ that enable users to decide on the perfect foundation for applying their make-up. The process involves taking photographs of your skin tone to help determine the ideal color shade for your make-up. Sephora Mobile app uses location-based marketing to recognize when a consumer enters their store. They have make-up artists equipped with iPads and other mobile devices to display an extensive range of makeup options and help you decide on the perfect match.  Sephora has shown an increase of 13% in organic sales as compared to the previous year.

Photo Credit: www.bustle.com

Casper, a reputed online seller of mattresses, has come up with an initiative known as pop-up showrooms where consumers can try out their mattresses before buying them online. Another initiative by the company is the 100-night trial offer where the consumers can return the mattress after testing it for 100 nights if they do not find it satisfactory.  

Photo Credit: www.campfire-capital.com

Yes, one has to agree that online sales are increasing. The availability of internet access devices like smartphones and tablets is playing a stellar role in it. However, at the same time, it has also given opportunities for the brick and mortar establishments to come up with new strategies to jack-up their same store sales. The race to grab the wallet share and maximum attention has resulted in the development of healthy competition where the ultimate winner is the customer.