“We don’t shop online. We buy online.” —Vibhu Norby, referring to the impact of Amazon
Non-selling stores are a different kind of value proposition — that offers experience or community to visitors to create dense and deep communication between brands and customers. Ones where data can be used to create new value — and queries can be made like, “How many square feet do you need to sell a device that costs $X?”
Fun of shopping comes from an experience. New D2C businesses will need to create engaging experiences and new ecosystems.
Amazon = pricing, convenience, driving is a pain. But want Experience as the differentiator in retail. In the day and age when the only channel was IRL, it was easy to control the retail universe.
Offline doesn’t have cookies. It is missing many of the regular tech commerce tricks.
Relevant interview is here,
“Seeing retail as an engagement and marketing engine, not as a supply chain mechanism.”
This all reminded me of the spiral shaped mall that was attached to a fashion brand in Insadong that offered space and POS equipment to keep old Korean crafts alive. It is Ssamziegil Market.
