Benedict Evans asks some great questions in this recent post about ecommerce penetration. Instead of just looking at the product itself and/or the way in which we buy it (online versus offline, for example), he focuses on the logistics model that accompanies the transaction. What… Read More
Benedict Evan’s most recent blog post, called “Amazon as experiment,” draws some interesting parallels between what Amazon is doing today (and experimenting with) and the beginning of mass retail, namely the invention of the department store. He also talks about some of the shortcomings of… Read More
This is an excellent talk by NYU professor Scott Galloway about Amazon, online grocery, and many other aspects of the retail landscape. The bits about Amazon’s scale and reach are fascinating. There is about 30 minutes of him speaking quickly and then another 15 minutes… Read More
This piece in the New Yorker about how e-commerce, and in particular JD.com, is transforming rural China is worth a read. In typical New Yorker fashion, it’s a good long-form read, but one that you can also listen to if that’s your thing. What’s immediately… Read More
A friend of mine was in Scottsdale last month for an ICSC conference where Garrick H. Brown (VP of Retail Research for the Americas at Cushman & Wakefield) delivered this retail presentation. My friend flipped it to me this week and below are a couple… Read More
The World Economic Forum recently posted the below chart showing that 1/5 of all grocery purchases in South Korea are done online. The calculation is e-commerce revenue as a percentage of total fast moving consumer goods revenue in the country. The explanation they give for… Read More
The Globe and Mail recently published an excellent article on “how e-commerce is driving a real estate revolution.” This is a topic that I’m very interested in: how online manifests itself offline. Not surprisingly, the article talks a lot about Amazon, including their 4th warehouse in… Read More
The New York Times just ran an interesting piece on “how the growth of e-commerce is shifting retail jobs.” Here are some of the key takeaways (all US data). Online shopping accounts for about 8.4% of all retail sales. But e-commerce related jobs are growing way… Read More
The big news on Friday was that Amazon has agreed to buy grocery chain Whole Foods for $13.4 billion. Some people – such as Bruce Berkowitz, who manages the $2.3 billion Fairholme Fund and who is the second largest shareholder of Sears Holdings Corp. –… Read More
Venture capitalist Benedict Evans recently published a post on his blog called, Ten Year Futures. If you haven’t already noticed, I really enjoy this sort of curiosity and line of thinking. Here is an excerpt where he talks about retail being at a tipping point:… Read More
