Interesting article on Slate by Farhad Manjoo, a pretty divisive "authority" on digital matters: http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/technology/2012/11/amazon_wal_mart_why_the_e_commerce_giant_beats_the_big_box_retailer.html
The author tried to replace his XBox on Black Friday and failed miserably, highlighting some reasons why he says Walmart is facing increasing disadvantage vs. ecommerce players like Amazon. He focuses on logistics and people. Anyone following Walmart's recent performance knows there's some truth to that.
However, his points on where Walmart is headed, bridging online with brick and mortar, are certainly fascinating when we look at this convergence that has been a bit slower than most expected:
In particular, Wal-Mart has stores. By making its 4,000 physical locations more friendly to smartphones and more plugged-in to the Web, Wal-Mart is planning to do amazing things, including letting you order something and get it delivered that same day from your local store; pick up your online order in a store on the day you order it (a feature that’s already available); and pay for your in-store purchases on your smartphone, skipping the checkout lines entirely. "We are uniquely positioned to give customers anytime, anywhere access to Wal-Mart by combining the smartphone, online, and the physical stores," Duke told me. "Ultimately, that will give us an edge over any competitor."
This is all food for thought - if Walmart can make the above happen they can ride a new wave for many years. Longer term, though, online seems to be where it's at.
The comments btw are hilarious - they slay him for substantiating anything by using Black Friday as an example.
Wow, what an amazing information!! Thanks so much.
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