Sears never imagined that its stores would become Amazon warehouses

• Retail has taken a drastic turn that began before the COVID-19 pandemic and Sears stores have become proof of it.

• Within large consumer countries such as the United States, more than 8,000 stores were closed during 2019, according to a projection by IHL Group.

• The point of sale is being reconverted and betting on new functions, such as carrying out operational activities and thereby meeting online demand.

The physical points of sale are rethinking and assuming activities that are due to the fact that consumption has migrated in a large percentage to digital media.

The case that we will analyze in this note, where Sears stores are becoming Amazon warehousing centers, reminds us of the role of retail and the new scenarios towards which consumption is migrating.

Something that will also help us understand this new trend is to see cases such as businesses that have opted for social networks, to make their points of sale into interesting content generation centers.

Advertising in times of COVID-19

Sears never imagined becoming an Amazon warehouse

The demand that Amazon is registering is forcing it to take over spaces of competitors, which for years have sold in the retail market, only that they were left without the opportunity that the company of Jeff Bezos dominates in e-commerce.

Amazon is in talks with Simon Property Group, one of the largest operators in physical points of sale, to rent spaces that were previously occupied for retail stores. J.C. Penney and Sears.

In an analysis of The Wall Street Journal, the proposal seems like a win win for Amazon and for the mall operator. For the first it would mean having distribution centers in urban areas to be able to make the delivery of their orders more efficient, for the second it would mean ensuring the rent of their spaces, but it would be sacrificing one of the oldest principles of retail, pedestrian traffic.

Amazon has experimented with all kinds of delivery strategies, with which it has sought to streamline its e-commerce business, but it has been a huge challenge to achieve it. While it maintains very important investments in the development of technologies such as delivery with drones, the main advance has been achieved in what is logical, betting on distribution points close to the consumer.

With the talks that Amazon supposedly has with Simon Property Group, two trends are patented. The first is that pedestrian traffic begins to cease to be a key part of the retail business equation. Second, we will begin to measure businesses by square meters of distribution and no longer in meters of points of sale.

Among the brands that have understood this trend and have the power to make drastic adjustments are Zara, which has begun to migrate its employees from physical points of sale to logistics centers to meet the demand for products through the Internet and is building a mega building specially dedicated to the production of content for your website.

Ups and downs in points of sale

Physical points of sale have registered a series of ups and downs throughout these years and figures from IHL Group demonstrate this, noting that in three years, the United States has maintained a curious rhythm of opening and closing stores.

Within these projections, it is noted that during 2017 more than 18,500 stores were opened and more than 14,400 stores were closed.

When 2018 arrived, the opening of more than 21 thousand 213 stores and the closing of 19 thousand 731 stores, already for 2019 the opening of 11 thousand 393 stores and the closing of 8 thousand 428 stores were registered.