Retail has seen nothing but change over the past two-plus decades. Just travel back in time to the end of the ’90s. Believe by Cher was at the top of the charts, the Denver Broncos won their second Superbowl in a row, Titanic dominated the box office, and ER was the most popular show on the air. All through this, big box stores like Home Depot and Circuit City were the places to go to shop, and the mall was where to go to get out of the house and look for clothes or toys, with department store giants like Sears and JCPenney often anchoring the mall experience.
But between the great recession, COVID-19, and the rise of the Internet, retail has gone from change to even more accelerated change. It’s not that people aren’t shopping any more—they absolutely are—but the way they are doing it is very different. The department stores at the malls, even the malls themselves, are no longer the only game in town, and people are looking beyond going to the store to get what they want. It’s as easy as scrolling a smartphone to find exactly the product that you are looking for.
So now that we are halfway through the 2020s, what do people want when they shop? What does a great shopping experience look like? While where people go to shop has changed, regardless of the venue or even whether it is real or virtual, for shoppers, it often boils down to two important elements: convenience and accessibility. They want to find the product they want with little fuss. They want the product to be as good as or better than advertised, and when they find it, they want the action of purchasing to be seamless and quick. The big difference is that they want all this on their terms, wherever they are, in the way that works best for them.
When it comes to the in-store, human experience, it’s often the employee working in the store that makes or breaks the sale. If shoppers have a question, they want the person answering to have knowledge about the product and understand where they are coming from so that the employee can provide them with tailored suggestions. This not only makes the consumer feel special; they also begin to trust the employee and the store.
It’s also not surprising that convenience and accessibility come into play here. People want to talk to staff members who are available for them and get answers to their questions right away. An interesting example of how this plays out can be found at the local hardware store. In the U.S., the Ace Hardware chain of smaller stores, about 7,000 to 10,000 square feet on average, has stolen a lot of the thunder from the big hardware players like Home Depot. These smaller stores, situated right in communities and selling much more than nuts, bolts, and paint, are resonating with the evolving shopping psyche of today’s rushed consumers, according to industry watchers. Each store carries about 25,000 to 30,000 unique products.
While the big box stores cater to the contractor or the homeowner doing remodeling work, these kinds of projects have slowed and now those big retailers are seeing declines. Ace, meanwhile, benefits as people continue to take on more modest projects. Michael Brown, a partner in consulting firm Kearney’s, tells CNN about this trend toward smaller and more intimate retail experiences. “It’s an interesting phenomenon,” said Brown. “Ace is your local customized, intimate hardware store where I can go in, get something very quickly, talk to people that I know.” Brown also notes how the stores are close to home and easily meet his project needs. “They’ve built a unique niche and their stores are also bringing a local flavor to them.”
This an important pivot from past convention. People are less willing to go out of their way to go to a store to get something, so it had better be a worthwhile venture. Convenience is dominating many aspects of shopping.
Another point to think about when it comes to today’s consumers is that they want to feel more knowledgeable than ever before. Scouring comparative websites and doing research are the new norm for shoppers, especially for larger ticket items. People will often come in knowing the pros and cons of a product and what the competition has on offer.
This is where shopping and the rise of the Internet intersect. People have instant access to pricing, reviews, and information about most any given product. Now that all this information is literally at our fingertips, it’s the big themes of convenience and accessibility which e-commerce must deliver on. This means end-to-end fulfillment—if you want that waffle iron at three in the morning, you should be able to find out why one online retailer’s is better than the rest, order it, pay for it, and have it on your doorstep shortly, making one-click access important. And none of this works without seamless delivery. If the customer doesn’t ultimately get the item they want delivered to their door in a timely manner, it is a failure. And that will impact how they perceive the experience and ultimately the brand behind it.
There is also the tricky and costly reality of returning items, a balance between trying to protect the business from receiving damaged or phantom returns while refunding customers as quickly and conveniently as possible. Capital One Shopping Research notes that nearly 123 million Americans will go clothes shopping online this year. Within that number, one out of every four of those items will be returned. That means billions in lost revenue for retailers, not to mention packaging waste, fuel waste, shipping costs, and frustration all around.
This is probably one of the biggest sticking points with e-commerce. How do people try something on? Ever since clothing stores first opened, people have tried on items to make sure they were satisfied with what they were about to buy. How does that work when you are on a bus going home from work scrolling your phone? This brings us to apps such as GlanceAI, a free virtual styling app for iOS and Android, and Google’s new Try-On tool, which uses generative AI to show you how clothes will look on your body. Upload a full-body selfie and in seconds, GlanceAI shows photorealistic images of you wearing outfits curated to your body type, skin tone, and even local weather. If you like what you see, you can tap to shop similar products from retailers.
According to GlanceAI, in less than a month from the app’s launch, it’s created more than 40 million personalized outfit images for over 1.5 million users in the U.S. alone, with 40 percent of them shopping in the app on a weekly basis. GlanceAI earns money through affiliate sales. “We’re not trying to turn you into someone else,” GlanceAI CEO Naveen Tewari told USA Today. “We’re trying to help you discover the best version of you. It’s not just ‘what shirt fits me?’ It’s ‘what outfit makes sense for me right now, in my city, with my vibe?’”
While e-commerce is growing and shopping in person at stores is declining, many successful businesses know that you don’t have to sacrifice one for the other. An omnichannel approach is one that combines e-commerce and the traditional retail experience and can give customers a unified experience no matter how they choose to shop on a particular day. It can mean a hybrid experience—being able to order and buy your coffee ahead of time and simply swinging by to pick it up, for instance. Of course, a lot of elements must work together to make such offerings successful.
Probably unsurprisingly, the root of many challenges is technology. Consider customer data being trapped in different systems that don’t talk to each other or a salesperson being left in the lurch, unable to access a customer’s details when they are standing on the store floor with them. Even if systems are working, data uploads may not be instantaneous, and customers can be left with the frustrating experience of not getting the item they want after all.
Successful implementation of the omnichannel strategy isn’t easy. It requires employees to grapple with changes to how they traditionally go about their jobs. They may have to learn and use new devices and systems; perhaps the commission system would work differently. All this could lead to dissatisfaction and resistance to reaching the goal of a unified approach to a retail experience. And of course, these integrated IT systems don’t just pop up out of nowhere; they require considerable time to implement and a lot of capital to set up.
If one thing is certain, it is that more change to retail is surely on the horizon. Ultimately, customer satisfaction is the constant and guiding light. Where retailers shine is in making the shopping experience feel personal, accessible, and rewarding.
