Wake up retailers!
I’m in retail. Not a big box type store, a specialty type store along the lines of a GameStop, Candle store, Cell phone store. People who come to my store are coming there for what I sell. People don’t just come into my stores to wander and kill time like at a Wal-Mart or Target.
Today I went looking for a blue tooth earpiece and I knew what I wanted. I’d done my research. I wanted a Plantronics Discovery 975 Bluetooth Headset now that link will take you to Amazon.com where I have free 2nd day delivery and a price that was lower than the store I found it in today. I’m a fan of shopping locally when I can and when they have what I want. There are times when I want something right away and if I do all my shopping online all the local stores will dry up. We can’t ignore our local stores for just the big box stores or the Internet options. This Christmas should have been a HUGE wake-up call to retailers. The Internet isn’t going away. At least half of all Christmas shopping this year was done online among my friends. That’s money leaving town and jobs following the money out of this town.
I went to two cell phone stores today and one was super busy and under-staffed so I couldn’t get help. They had the thing I wanted, but it was locked on a peg and I couldn’t get it off and there was nobody to ring it up for me if I could have. One employee. Yes. I’m sure that helps your labor stay down, but you lost a sale when you were too busy to take my money.
Three doors down at another local wireless store they had the item I wanted and two sales associates working, both sitting on stools talking to each other when I walked in. I shopped for a bit, looked at the phones, no new ones, and still loving my HTC DROID Eris Android Phone, then I wandered and looked at cases for the phone. Evidently the girl on the left was having an ugly breakup with her boyfriend… no, I’m not kidding. So, I stood in front of the accessories and waited, fiddling with them for a minute or so, listening to their story, and then I left. I waved at them as I left the store. They smiled back at me.
Retailers. Wake up. You aren’t necessary any more. I’m not kidding. Nobody NEEDS to shop with you now. EVERYBODY can get what they want from somewhere else. I don’t care how you think your nearest competition is a hundred miles away. You’re wrong. Your nearest competition is as far away as the public library or the nearest internet connection.
If you and your employees don’t want to be in retail keep doing what you’re doing and soon you won’t be in retail. The Internet isn’t going away. If you don’t want to go away you’d better step it up or I’ll wave good bye to you as I leave your store.
The Wake up retailers! by Rich Griffith, unless otherwise expressly stated, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.