“To buy or not to buy” is the perpetual question that I’m always asking myself while online shopping. My bank card says no, but my answer, of course, is always an enthusiastically resounding YES. As many of my close friends can attest to, I am a serial online shopper part of a new, largely expanding demographic of millennials and Generation Z shoppers who value convenience and efficiency in my shopping experience. So, when I stumbled across an article detailing online store, Rent the Runway’s new marketing project aimed at price-sensitive shoppers – like myself – I was immediately intrigued.
Rent the Runway is a subscription-based online fashion rental service that allows its customers to rent out expensive pieces from labels such as Oscar de la Renta, Vince and Diane von Furstenberg for a fraction of the original cost. The company recently announced a new budget-friendly pricing option of $89 a month, which is a 35% price decrease from the regular $139 monthly subscription. The only restrictions to the plan are a limited number of monthly rentals and some higher-end designer exclusions.
With more and more innovative e-commerce sites, like Rent the Runway, positioning themselves in markets that were previously seen as blue oceans, it seems that traditional brick and mortar retailers will become more and more obsolete in the future if they do not try and adjust to the changing market of consumers.
“Channels which traditionally dominated the field are in steady decline worldwide. Step forward the new order: e-commerce and discounters, cannibalizing the big retailers with their promise of convenience and lower prices” – Kantar Worldpanel global shopper and retail director Stephanie Roger.
For many millennials, the most convenient option is the now the best option. E-commerce sites have now become one-stop-shops for almost any consumer desire at the simple click of a button; and with huge companies like Amazon championing fast and reliable delivery, the most significant caveats to online shopping is a consumer’s need to feel and see the item they are purchasing.
However, there are many e-commerce sites who are actively working to integrate the dominant customer need to physically interact with their purchase with their current business model. Take, for example, the “guideshops” explored in Teaghan McNeill’s blog. Created by popular online store, Bonobos, the concept allows customers to try on samples in store but have their purchases delivered to their home, ensuring that there are always specific sizes and colours in stock at all times for customers to try on, and eliminating any fears of disappointing a customer’s product expectations.
“Technology is fast-changing the way people shop, and with e-commerce and discounters set to continue their march at the expense of large-format retailers, there is an urgent need for retail reconfiguration across the world.” – Kantar Worldpanel global shopper and retail director Stephanie Roger.
All in all, with the current rate that e-commerce sites are able to rapidly adapt and alter their services to better serve consumers, brick and mortar retailers will soon find themselves put in a precarious position within the retail industry trying to fight for relevance in a consumer market filled fast-paced, efficiency seeking customers. Traditional retailers need to start thinking of ways to help solve these consumer problems so that their customers can go back to thinking about the more important questions in life. Like whether “to buy or not to buy”.
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