Re: “In store VS Online shopping” by Sofia Bautista.

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Just like Sofia said, the development of online shopping gives the retail store a huge threat. However, I think there are much more market competition going on in online market. There are many individual sellers at eBay in Canada or Taobao in China that sell goods in much cheaper prices. Those individual sellers may not have enough money to pay for the rent and servers’ wages for opening a retail shop, but they can operate their businesses online. This low entry barrier cause lots of people get in to the market and therefore cause a higher competition.

There are definite more choices and cheaper prices of commodities provided online, but there are also risks that customers must take. Customers cannot see or test the actual commodities that they are buying but only see photos of that good. Therefore, the quality of that commodity is always unknown. Consumers need to face a high risk of getting a low quality commodity by shopping online.

In my opinion, there is no definite winner or loser for online shops and retail stores, what customers should think about is how they value the quality and price. If they care more about price over quality, they should consider shopping online, but if quality values more, go to retail stores and see the actual commodity would be a safer choice.

Reference:

Sofia’s blog: https://blogs.ubc.ca/sofiabautista/2014/10/23/in-store-vs-online-shopping/

Website: http://finance.yahoo.com/news/ebay-canada-report-suggests-removal-113000886.html