Ready with the 'welcome neighbour' fruitbasket, retailers? Amazon opens Manchester pop-up shop The British High Street has a very unlikely saviour in the shape of Amazon following news that physical retail outlets are set to er, pop-up across the UK this year. The online shopping giant has opened a store in Manchester, stocking products from 10 of its small business sellers. Sellers will be given two weeks in the shop …
The sooner the High Street is killed off - or at least reinvents itself - the better!
Why would I want to drag myself (during limited opening hours - most of them when I'm at work) to a dirty, noisy, crowded place where I have to pay stupid amounts to park my car, in order to get a reduced range of products at top prices? I then have to lug them back to my car - and when I get home if I find that I don't like the product, I have no right of return.
Instead I buy just about everything online, where I can do it at a time that suits me, can comparison shop (both on suitability and on price), can get it delivered next day if I really need it that quickly, and have 14 days in which to decide whether or not to keep it.
Meanwhile in the US Amazon is buying up defunct shopping malls to use as distribution centers.
I predict in about 10 years Amazon will get the crazy idea to open categorized storefronts within the distribution centers where people can come look at the merchandise in person before purchasing.
Maybe they will just cut down what's left of the south American rain forest and open some garden centres there instead. What! I dunno but I'd like to know more about how sustainable (green), their trading model is? I know I'm an old fuddy duddy and this is all an amazing revolution in retail and all that, but I can't help feeling that we all need to be buying / producing less stuff, making what stuff we do buy last longer and, if need be, having the opportunity to easily take it back in store for repair / longevity treatment / complete recycling etc. Surely somebody like Mr. Bezos can see that the 'green light' is glowing more brightly these days, illuminating such a more beneficial business model.
Surely somebody like Mr. Bezos can see that the 'green light' is glowing more brightly these days, illuminating such a more beneficial business model.
I think that the only "green light" that it brings to mind for him is like the green light described in Stephen King's Needful Things. (You need a bookshop?)
Interesting that they have chosen it, but good luck with the Bradford store.
Few years back, let's say 2013, i was in the centre of Bradford, looking at their "town street map". The label pointing to the huge big hole in the centre said "New shopping development, opening 2008". IIRC.
Eventually it did open, resulting in the main pedestrian shopping precinct looking abandoned and derelict.
Amazon has a bricks 'n mortar presence in the US in the form of the Whole Foods grocery chain. They bought the chain a couple of years ago.
Amazon's other physical presence is through the Kohls store chain. Kohls accepts returns for Amazon; Amazon don't own the store chain but its to their mutual benefit since Amazon gets a reliable return pick up location and Kohls gets extra foot traffic through their store (which mostly sells clothing and housewares) by placing the return desk way in the back of the store. Win/Win.
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