Amazon was founded in 1994 and went public in 1997. By 1999, some 5 years after the company was started, only about 1% of total retail sales were being done online in the US. So you have to give it to Bezos, he saw what was coming and he got in early to help create it. This was not so obvious back in the mid 90s. The internet as a whole was still being viewed with skepticism, especially after the dot-com bubble.
Today, online shopping represents over 15% of total retail sales. (See above chart from Charlie Bilello.) The pandemic pop is over, but it looks like we've returned to a pretty clear trendline -- up and to the right. I guess the questions now are: When and where does this start to flatline? It doesn't seem likely that this goes to 100% in the foreseeable future, especially if you include grocery. But it's going to go a lot higher.
For myself, if I were to exclude food/grocery, I would say that the vast majority (80-90%) of my retail purchases are done online. Even if I'm in a physical store, I'll often pull out my phone to price compare. If it's cheaper on Amazon, I'll just order it there.
Here's another example.
This past summer when I was in Park City, I discovered the brand Vuori. I had heard of them before, but I had never actually seen or touched their clothes. It's great stuff. But instead of the store convincing me to buy something, it convinced me that I like the brand and that I should probably shop on their website at some point in the near future. And that's exactly what I ended up doing. (Sorry Lululemon. You're still my favorite.)
All of this is perhaps obvious in a world where 15% of total retail sales are happening online. But I would imagine that the retail landscape and our cities will look very different when this number goes even higher. Our cities were different at 1% compared to today at 15%; so imagine what 50% or 80% might be like.
Our server at lunch today told us that the Grouse Grind hike should take us about 45 minutes. She also mentioned that she has seen some people attempt it in flip flops, but that she would strongly advise against that. That was sound footwear advice. But even sans flip-flops, it still took Bianca and I about an hour and a half.
The Grouse Grind is no joke. It is 850 meters of nothing but steps and steep incline. But it is well worth it.
I’ve heard that some people do “the Grind” for meetings and/or business development. In fact, Chip Wilson, founder of Lululemon, has said before that he uses it to vet potential partners. It’s a way for him to test cultural alignment. That makes a lot of sense when you consider what Lululemon is all about.
This exact approach — you know, doing “the Grind” — may not make as much sense for other businesses and industries. But it doesn’t change the fact that culture is critical within organizations. And as far as I can tell, the most effective way to cultivate it and test for alignment is to be face-to-face.
Bloomberg Businessweek just published a longish article about Vancouver and the Chinese capital that fuels it. It’s called, The City That Had Too Much Money.
Most of you are already familiar with this narrative, but here’s an excerpt that talks about the city’s economic base and its apparent dependency on foreign capital:
Change will be difficult and fraught. Vancouver has been closely connected to Asia since the late 19th century, when the first Chinese laborers arrived to help build the trans-Canada railway, and the city is proud of its record of integrating immigrants. Also, beyond real estate, Vancouver’s economic base is shallow. It’s not the business capital of western Canada—that’s Calgary—and it has few major corporate headquarters or large-scale manufacturing operations. “Asian capital has kept this economy alive, end of story,” says Ron Shon, a Chinese-Canadian venture capitalist who arrived as a teenager in the late 1960s. “You can see it in every aspect of our lives.”
One of the things I found particularly interesting were Chip Wilson’s comments around what is going on. Chip is the founder of Lululemon and is largely credited with pioneering the current “athleisure” trend.
Yet as Wilson explains, sitting in his office on the top floor of a century-old warehouse, these days he’s as interested in bricks and mortar as in quick-drying fabrics. “The global capital flowing out of China across the world, you’d have to be an idiot not to acknowledge it,” he says. “You know, we could just be at the cusp of that.”
To profit from the deluge, he’s been buying up land all over town, especially in False Creek Flats, a derelict industrial area that’s slated for redevelopment. He estimates that about a third of his holdings are now in real estate. British Columbia’s current government may succeed in slowing inflows temporarily, Wilson says, but China’s boom has created many multimillionaires who need a place to put their money. “So where do you go if you’re Chinese? Sydney, maybe. But nowhere, probably, is more friendly than Vancouver.” One way or another, he says, those funds will find their way to Canada.
That’s why, Wilson says, whenever he returns from a trip to Asia, his first thought is simple: “Buy land, Chip. Buy land.”
For the full article, click here.
Image: Jens Kristian Balle/The Forbes Collection/Contour/Getty Images (via Bloomberg)