Imminent Demise of Most Dot Com Retailers? ... Oh-oh.

Good News for Bricks-and-Mortar Retailers... Forrester Research recently released a negative report on dot-com retailers (April 11, 2000). But it didn't get much play -- perhaps due its apocalyptic headline, "Forrester Research Predicts the Imminent Demise of Most Dot Com Retailers." Oh-oh. But it was pretty good news for click-and-mortar players. Here's what Forrester said online retailers should do to survive: "Online retailers must anchor themselves by building sustainable assets that will attain scale, service, and speed. Leaders will need to focus on hard assets that support high sales volumes and lower costs per transaction: a large, loyal customer base; in-house fulfillment capabilities; and a rock-solid internal organization." Hmm. Sounds like these guys need lots of physical stores and distribution facilities.

Just a day earlier (April 10), the New York Times had run an article on e-commerce with the following headline: "Mall developers fight back against the Internet by moving there themselves." The article mentioned a number of initiatives, including Simon Property's Clixnmortar, which has created the FastFrog and Your Sherpa services. According to Clixnmortar, FastFrog.com "is an interactive shopping tool that allows teens to use hand-held technology to scan items they want from favorite retailers, add those items to event specific wish lists on a personalized web site, and e-mail the wish lists to gift buyers." Aimed at time-constrained professionals, Your Sherpa "is a simple-to-use hand-held shopping tool, which allows busy adult shoppers to scan items from favorite retailers, pay through a single channel, and have those items conveniently delivered, avoiding the hassle of checkout lines."

So you've got the e-retailers on one side and the property owners on the other. But don't forget about the delivery services like Webvan and Kozmo who will deliver items like soda, batteries and diapers in one day (Webvan) or one hour (Kozmo)! Sounds like glory days for the consumer.

--Peter