Screwfix, a British online supplier to plumbers and electricians, has opened 270 shops since 2005. Bonobos, which sells men's clothing online, has opened several "Guideshops" in America. Zalando, a German online fashion store, opened a physical outlet in Berlin last year. Even Amazon has installed lockers in shopping malls where customers can pick up deliveries: a first step, perhaps, towards bricks-and-mortardom. All this suggests that online and traditional retailers are "migrating to a middle ground", says Matt Truman of True Capital, a fund that invests in consumer companies.

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Keywords: retail supply chain, supply chain management, value chain, value chain IT, online commerce, e-tailing, merged channels