As e-commerce shopping booms, Canadians are making their way to online stores and many of them are choosing outside merchants. At least 70 percent of Canadians' purchases in 2015 were from merchants based outside the country because these online retailers often have better prices or provide goods not available in Canada.
The next thing you try on at the mall might be a virtual reality headset. No longer relegated to video gamers, VR is coming to amusement parks, movie theaters and classrooms. But the technology presents a major opportunity for retailers as they try to lure fickle shoppers into their stores, particularly as consumers shift more of their buying habits online.
A conversation with retail industry experts on how the coming of the omnichannel is radically altering customers' expectations of service - and how retailers are being forced to respond.
An annual study of consumer attitudes toward online retailing technology zeroes in on the growing acceptance of delivery drones, mobile payments and virtual reality.
Shotfarm, vendor of a cloud-based application for managing and exchanging product information, has released a pair of enhancements to its user apps, the Dashboard and Plugin Store.
Shoppers, particularly younger ones, believe it's important for retailers to have a physical store, and they expect that store to make a good first impression.
Ninety-nine percent of consumers who take delivery of online orders in brick-and-mortar stores are pleased with the experience, according to a recent survey. Twenty-nine percent said the option is why they placed the order in the first place.
While Amazon.com Inc. is already a force to be reckoned with when it comes to online retail, one Wall Street firm says it's about to move up the ranks in yet another industry: U.S. food and beverage.
Brick-and-mortar shopping isn't dead, but it is certainly on the decline: just 57 percent of urban consumers said they preferred to make discretionary purchases in stores, while 39 percent claim their last such purchase was made online.
