The Future of Retail | Overnight on Radio ABC Local & ABC Perth
Woolworth’s recently published a report on the Future of the Supermarkets complete with predictions about who their future consumers may be and the what, where, when and how of what they might want from them and this was the spark that started the chat between Rod Quinn of ABC Local’s Overnight and I.
In this 45 minute radio segment we discussed all things Future Retail and took a tonne of callers questions (who knew there were so many people awake and interested at 4.15 a.m.) around the topics of:
• The increasing shoppers’ desire for “local” and “fresh” produce
• Whether in-store shopping will be for these items only
• Whether long-term food items, i.e. pantry items, will be ordered almost entirely online
• The change in the grocery shopping experience and self checkouts
• How “local” and “fresh” produce is monitored and marketed
• Whether the “average shopper” has changed from a nuclear family / mum buying the groceries
• How Australia’s supermarkets will adapt, or how they need to adapt, to meet this desire for a different shopping experience
• The cramped aisle concept being on its way out as supermarkets evolve into something altogether different.
• How likely the Big Two – Coles & Woolworths, or Colesworth as we affectionately called them, may be affected by changing consumer sentiment in the future?
A great discussion and some really great callers questions, click on the this link ovn3, wait for the pop up screen and then choose your player or download option.
ABC Perth Radio – Breakfast Show with James Lush
A great topic always has lot’s of different angles and possibilities and I picked up the thread of the Future of Retail later that same day on my regular Saturday Breakfast segment with James Lush on ABC Perth, have a listen to this for a different take on the Future of Retail:
Frequently Asked Questions
Q: What were the most significant signals about the future of retail when this discussion aired?
The most significant retail signals at the time of this discussion included: the accelerating shift of commodity and comparison purchases to online (already past the point of reversal for electronics, books, and standardised goods); the early evidence that the surviving physical retail experiences were those offering genuine sensory, social, or service dimensions that online could not replicate; the emergence of ‘showrooming’ (using physical stores to evaluate before buying online) as a structural challenge to traditional retail economics; and the first serious experiments with data-driven personalisation and dynamic pricing that would later become standard in online retail.
Q: What determines whether a physical retail category survives the digital shift?
Physical retail survival is determined by whether the category offers something that digital cannot — and the honest answer is that fewer categories than retailers would like to believe meet this criterion. The categories with genuine survival signals are those where: the sensory and tactile experience of evaluation is genuinely irreplaceable (fresh food, furniture, clothing requiring fit); where the social experience of shopping is the primary value rather than a byproduct of acquisition; where expert service and advice creates value beyond the product itself; and where the immediacy of having the product now rather than tomorrow creates genuine value. Convenience and price are not survival signals for physical retail — those advantages belong to digital.
Q: How does the future of retail connect to the broader transformation of main streets and shopping precincts?
The retail transformation is fundamentally a real estate and urban planning challenge as much as a commerce challenge: the vacancy rates in traditional retail precincts that resulted from digital shift created spaces that needed repurposing; the precincts that have survived and thrived have done so by evolving toward experience, food and beverage, health and fitness, and community services that generate foot traffic independent of product purchase; and the planning question of what main streets and town centres are for — when they are no longer primarily destinations for commodity acquisition — is one of the most significant urban design questions of the current generation.
Q: How can I book Morris Misel for a retail futures, consumer behaviour, or urban transformation keynote?
Contact the booking team at morrismisel.com/event-organisers.
Woolworth’s recently published a report on the Future of the Supermarkets complete with predictions about who their future consumers may be and the what, where, when and how of what they might want from them and this was the spark that started the chat between Rod Quinn of ABC Lo.
The window between a signal arriving and it demanding a response is shortening. The Future of Retail is already shaping strategy conversations in forward-looking organisations. Treating it as a future concern rather than a present one builds a preparedness gap that will have to be closed under pressure.
The most important question is not whether The Future of Retail will matter, but how quickly it will matter in your specific context. Leaders benefit most from mapping the ripple effects early — not just the direct impact but the second and third-order consequences that arrive later and hit harder. That is the practical work of foresight.
