Retail Trends of 2020

I wanted to write a tongue-and-cheek Op-ed about retail trends. The usual suspects of retail trends lists are so cliche and invariably a repeat of previous years. I wanted to write something a bit different. There isn't much objectivity or lists that are free from bias out there.

While we write about the retail apocalypse of store closures at the Last Futurist, it’s important to note that a multitude of trends in the retail sector are impacted by technology in general that boosts the customer experience and not just consumer sentiment or product demand.  

The emergence of e-commerce as a broad trend really is transformative. The retail industry is also just a very dynamic space, with a war of brands and changing consumer sentiment and preferences that make the retail sector pretty fun to watch. 

2019 was the year of BOPIS, the trend of shoppers buying online and picking up in-store for the total control and speed of the experience. 

From experiential physical retail to e-commerce innovations, retail is very much an industry in flux. This makes it one of the most interesting to watch as technology, automation and algorithms creep in. 

By 2030, AI will be managing Walmart stores, not actual humans. These locations will also be filled with different kinds of retail robots. That’s just the future of society that will be mirrored in the retail sector. 

As NRF has started I always get a bit more in the mood to write about the ever-changing retail industry. Digital transformation lives with how we shop too, and this changes a bit each year. Though not as much as you might think! The United States, is not China, after all.

NRF 2020 Vision: a week ago Retail’s Big Show kicked off on Sunday, January 12 in New York City with a record breaking 40,000 attendees including 16,000 retailers, 800 exhibitors, 200 sessions, and more than 100 hours of content anticipated -- though it never really seems to move the dial. 

Retail has the same watchwords as it did a few years ago, but there’s room for more automation and machine intelligence to creep in with better personalization. 

1. Smart Stores

Between Alibaba’s New Retail movement and Amazon’s AmazonGo stores, the future of the physical store is getting a lot more data orientated with new customer experiences embedded with the potential. 

Cashier-less stories will become more common. Omnichannel retail will get smarter in a 5G world and younger shoppers will prefer NOT to be served by humans. 

Smart stores of various sizes will leverage customer experiences that are more convenient, intuitive and minimalistic. This includes even pop-up stores. 

AmazonGo has been slow to roll-out in the U.S. with very cautious and conservative pilots. This could change somewhat in 2020, as more big cities get access to the LiDAR-like convenience of being able to grab and go. 

2. BOPIS Will Continue to Evolve 

In 2019 buy-online pick-up in store really went mainstream and in 2020 it will become even more convenient. 

Part of why consumers prefer and love BOPIS is the speed and control it provides. This past holiday season shoppers took advantage of BOPIS services in order to save money. Additionally, 49% of consumers stated that in-store pickup is quicker than at-home delivery.

To read the full list of retail trends go here. Subscribe to the Last Futurist on the top right for more content like this.