Online Shopping

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Online shopping, since its introduction to the world, has been an amazing service that makes everyday life a lot easier. Instead of having to go to the store and stroll through the isles, you can open your laptop and scroll through a website. You can get things that stores in your area may not have, saving you a really long road trip for a birthday present. However, every positive has a negative, and online shopping comes at the cost of retail stores.

With the debut of online shopping and Amazon, retail stores have been on the run. E-commerce is estimated to make up 10% of all retail profits. Which is a lot when you consider, cars, food, and fuel are part of that. Amazon also makes of 53% of that E-commerce portion making it by far the leading site.

Online shopping has poised a huge threat to once giant retail stores. Sports Authority, Target, Macy's, JC Penney, and Toys R Us, are just a few of the big businesses that have either gone out of business or are heavily feeling the effects of the big switch to online. Retail stores now, are usually used for the consumer to go see the product and feel what it's like. Then they go home and buy it online because it's cheaper. Tesla Motors, for example. was thinking about shutting down their stores because people bought their cars online. However, the store is the place where people go to test drive the car and feel it out. This could be indicative of a switch in purpose of retail stores. Instead of being the place where people go to buy things, stores may turn into a "testing" facility for the consumer to see if they like the product.





https://www.cheatsheet.com/money-career/stores-destroyed-by-amazon.html/
https://www.forbes.com/sites/stevendennis/2017/06/19/should-we-care-whether-amazon-is-systematically-destroying-retail/#4c11bcf56b1f

Comments

  1. AnonymousApril 7, 2019 at 11:55 PM

    As society becomes more evolved and processes become more efficient due to technology, one of the aspects that we have to look at is the ethics of the effects on certain industries. This is similar to the question of whether it is ethical to replace older jobs with more efficient technology. For example, one might argue that the increased efficiency of technology allows for items to be purchased at a cheaper price. However, one argument from the other side is that you cannot quantify the losses that brick and mortar stores are experiencing by losing sales to online retailers such as Amazon. Ultimately, this is an issue that must be continually addressed as it progresses.
    https://www.business.com/articles/brick-and-mortar-vs-ecommerce-stores/

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