Fall 2019 - Inside Outdoor Magazine

Inside Outdoor | FALL 2019 39 little choice but to apply technol- ogy to streamlining and automat- ing their non-selling functions, RSR analysts warn us. “Retailers must find a way to manage their in-store operational costs to offset lower margins,” ar- gue Rosenblum and Rowen. “Now that price is not a differentiator and we have reached ‘the bottom,’ profits will be harder to come by. And so, optimizing non-selling functions becomes ever more criti- cal for stores.” Further integration of online and in-store systems and informa- tion – across customers and inven- tory – seems a given. Retailers simply can’t have core customers entering a store with more vis- ibility into product and pricing than the store’s employees or IT systems might have; tomorrow’s consumers simple won’t have to stand for it. And if shoppers can find something on their phones, and they can find it in blue, the store experience will be expected to deliver it – either today, tomorrow or by drone on their doorstep – or that store visit will be judged a failure by the customer. It won’t be easy, and it will require significant investment in the intelligence of inventory management and fulfilment, physical and virtual in- tegration, and point-of-sale and core relationship management functions. RSR’s retail winners, in particular, are optimistic about the opportuni- ties in utilizing the store as a type of “fulfillment center” for the various purchases made across channels. Early experiments are proving suc- cessful, said RSR, raising expecta- tions that shoppers who come into stores to fill orders placed online (or return items in the case of Kohl’s) will buy additional merchandise and raise profitability. Certainly BOPIS, or buy-online-pick-up-in-store, for one, has quickly gained popularity among shoppers and captured the attention of larger retail brands. The thinking behind this trend is relatively straightforward: onmi-shop- pers increasingly will expect to move seamlessly from phone or desk to re- tail doorstep, taking their entire path to purchase along with them. If they are willing to get off the couch and come to a store, or the desire “to go out shop- ping” strikes, a store better be ready to deliver or it’s a lost opportunity. A shopper that might enter a store to showroom must be converted before they leave into a buyer. There are some who connect “seamless” to self-service and the idea that consumers will prefer to let tech- nology support a self-serve shopping experience. But RSR believes this is a “false flag.” “The most frictionless experience for a shopper is pushing a button on- line and having the product show up at their door,” said RSR. “That’s not why people go to stores.” Rather, consumers go to stores “to touch and feel the product and interact with other humans, generally employees, who they expect to actu- ally know something about the prod- uct,” continued RSR. “Consumers will eventually expect even lower prices in exchange for self-service. And as of this writing, retailers simply have no more margin to give away.” So, rather than self-service-en- abling the sales floor, RSR suggests retailers use technology to empower employees. Once again, consumers will be underwhelmed by floor em- ployees with less access to inventory information than the smartphone in their pockets. m Average Additional In-Store Spending by BOPIS Customers Source: NAPCO Research 70% 64% 1-10% 13% 27% 29% 13% 12% 6% 2% 11-20% 21-30% 31-40% 41-50% More than 50% None Start at the Trailhead of Your Career FIND A JOB, POST A JOB The ultimate destination to finding a job in the Outdoor Industry