As a recent New York Times article pointed out, shoppers are starting to look for alternatives to the larger online merchants, even though they might have to settle for doing business with a smaller web retailer instead of local stores.
Where they might have bought books before from Amazon, some buyers are now trying independent book sellers like Powell’s Books to serve their needs.
As local stores continue to disappear, music fans are finding small sites like cdRoots, where the selection includes a unique mix of artists from around the world, many of whom aren’t carried by major web retailers.
And it’s not always about price alone. Shoppers seem to prefer the personal service and quirky selections found at the smaller web shops like cdRoots.
Changes in customer’s buying habits continue to move business away from the big box stores. CompUSA and Circuit City are two mega retailers that ended up closing all their physical stores and now only do business online. The same thing happened to both Tower Records and Blockbuster, the latter being a victim of the ‘Netflix effect’ as video rentals moved almost totally online.
And even when they don’t go belly up, large retailers can still be stung by the own misguided policies. Best Buy earned itself a bad reputation after cancelling orders for tens of thousands of online customers in the run-up to this past holiday season. Sales also suffered after Amazon ran a promotion offering discounts on various electronics items if users went to a Best Buy store and scanned the item’s barcode in from there.
The move online to e-commerce is also helping shoppers looking for unique gifts and artwork. Sites like Etsy enable individual artists and crafters to sell their goods online without the hassle of having to maintain a full website with payment processing.
An enterprising bike shop owner in Chicago has created Little Independent, an online directory that showcases goods and services from smaller local merchants. Little Independent not only promotes the merchant’s retail store, but also helps them go online and sell their wares through an online marketplace.
