High Street or Information Super-Highway?

For years the High Street has been the focal point of every town and city across the United Kingdom. However, nowadays the High Street is under threat of extinction due to rapid expansion of the information super-highway. Of course the current economic climate has made things increasingly high for High Street retailers. Many smaller independent companies are struggling under the crushing weight of commercial rents, credit problems and taxation. Bigger companies like M&S, Argos and Debenhams are faring slighter better than their smaller rivals, yet sales figures show that they too are getting hit hard by the present retailing slump.

Traditionally if you wanted to look for beds or a new sofa you would head down to your nearest High Street furniture store and take a look round. Nowadays, thou people can do it all from the luxury of their own homes. One click and you can order practically anything that you could imagine and have it delivered straight to your door. In the face of the success of E-commerce sites around the globe, old school retailers have had to make that digital jump to compete against smaller rivals. Most companies now offer both a High Street shop and an online store. Lack of an online presence is tantamount to commercial suicide nowadays.

Take Play.com as a prime example. From virtually nowhere they have become a major player in the dvd/cd market. Being an online retailer has many benefits; you don’t have to pay exorbitant commercial rents for prime high street locations, instead like Play.com you can build your empire anywhere so long as you can maintain an effective delivery system. You get to cut down on staff wages, heating, electric and water rates by running your business from a warehouse rather than from the High Street. You open your business to a massive market, rather than focusing on isolated high density locations. In fact there are very little downsides to running an E-commerce website.

The greatest benefit of the online retail revolution is access to unique and specific products that you would not normally find at your local store. For example if you were environmentally minded and you wanted to do your bit to fight global warming then you can find a huge range of eco-products online that are generally sold by smaller independent retailers. There are some great sites out there if you want to find an eco-friendly bed or even a home grown chair. The net also allows you access to the latest and hottest tech trends which again would be harder to acquire on the High Street.

Unfortunately for traditional retailer there is no longer any choice, you simply have to have an online presence nowadays if you want to survive in business. Without one you are just confining your options and failing to capitalise on the wider markets which belong in the ether of the information super-highway.

Posted on
Wednesday, April 8th, 2009

Filed under:
Technology.