How Retailers Compete with Prime Day?
Amazon Prime Day starts at 3 a.m. ET Tuesday and lasts through Wednesday. Target will have “Deal Days” and Best Buy will jumpstart Black Friday sales on those days. Walmart holds its “Big Save Event” from 7 p.m. ET Sunday through Thursday.
Big-box retailers like Walmart, Target try to beat Amazon on speed by focusing on curbside pickup.
- Walmart, Target and Best Buy will try to divert dollars from Amazon Prime Day by offering their own deals and fulfilling orders quickly through curbside and in-store pickup.
- Buy online, pick up in store options have gained popularity during the coronavirus pandemic as a safe, convenient alternative to browsing store aisles.
- Yet big-box retailers will have to prove they can keep up as deep discounts and holiday shopping drive demand
Curbside Pick is Growing
Curbside allows certain big-box retailers to convert their stores into mini e-commerce fulfillment centers, while avoiding the money-losing step of shipping goods to homes.
The popularity of curbside pickup reveals that the future of retail is not just more packages piling up on people’s doorsteps. Beyond satisfying the need for contactless shopping in the pandemic, it taps into Americans’ desire to drive to a store, a pull that can be just as strong as, or even stronger than, the convenience of home delivery.
Target said its curbside sales grew more than 700 percent in the last quarter, while Best Buy reported nearly $5 billion in online revenue in the second quarter, a company record, and said 41 percent of that had come from curbside or in-store pickup.
The rise in curbside pickup, part of a larger surge in e-commerce sales, has implications for preserving retail jobs, though workers’ duties are likely to transform. It is also helping to keep brick-and-mortar spaces relevant when thousands of storefronts have emptied out as more customers move online.
Sorting out Return Management
Office supply chain Staples is following the lead of retailers like Kohl’s KSS 0.0% and is planning to use its stores as drop-off locations for returns of goods sold by other online brands.
Staples is partnering with returns and reverse logistics tech firm Optoro to allow consumers to bring returns to the more than 1,000 Staples stores in this country, and get credit for returned items through a QR code on their phones.
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