Store-based retail is having an identity crisis. What is the role of bricks and mortar in a post-pandemic world dominated by ecommerce and digital-first path-to-purchase?
For thousands of retailers, the pandemic was the final blow after years of declining sales, growing debt mountains and high rates and rents. In the UK, retailers that once were known as the anchors of high streets, like the almost 250-year-old fashion chain Debenhams, collapsed. In the US, the pandemic had a similarly devastating effect on the store-based retail landscape, with more than 12,000 shops shuttering for good - a record number.
While economies may be gradually opening as a result of successful vaccination programmes in certain countries, the headwinds for bricks-and-mortar retail remain as ecommerce gets more sophisticated and convenient. This is raising big question marks over the traditional physical retail economic model.
Certainly, the age of the shop as we knew it to be from the 1950s to the early 2000s is over. So, a year after a life-threatening pandemic and strict lockdowns shut non-essential retail and kept people at home, what is the state of the store - and what is its future?
Please join Edge Retail Insight analysts David Gordon, Director, Omnichannel Insights and Florence Wright, Senior Analyst to hear their views on the retail landscape today, future consumer trends and how retailers and the consumer goods brands that work with them must change to be fit for purpose in an evolving and complex era that will look nothing like the past. In a varied discussion hosted by Harry Wallop, former retail editor at The Daily Telegraph and regular Dispatches presenter, and drawing on the research, data and insights from Edge Retail Insight’s Store of the Future 2021 report, David and Florence covered:
- How ecommerce is changing the role and purpose of the store
- How leading retailers are adapting their store formats to stand out and add value in a blended online-offline world
- How the changing store format is impacting CPG relationships and what suppliers can do to win in this new retail landscape.
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