HYBRID Stores and post-Covid
RETAIL STRATEGIES
When online retail sales hit over 40% compared to offline, in 2020, many were predicting that one long-term impact of the pandemic would be the end of the physical store, maybe not immediately but certainly an acceleration of its demise would occur.
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hat we have seen though is a return to physical stores, if not quite at the same levels as pre-pandemic, then at least to similar.
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August- October 2023 · Retail Technology Innovation Hub
Human beings are intrinsically social animals, as the cliché goes, “people buy from other people” and there has certainly been a desire for customers to return to retail as a personal experience, to get back that experiential element of the
consumer journey. We’ve already seen that many shoppers are not happy with the drive to convenience at all costs in-store. They have the option of uber convenience online if they want it. What the return to physical retail is showing is