Posted 3 days ago
Online Shopping - The High Street's Downfall
I think it would be nice for us to reverse our, dare I say, dependence, on online shopping. The 24/7, at your fingertips retail phenomenon has been both positive and negative. On the face of it online shopping has enabled almost everyone to purchase almost anything, anywhere. For good or bad it has increased price competition and comparison. But it's also squeezed out the stalwarts of our high streets. Almost all of them feel and look neglected and run-down. Shops are closing at speed. We are losing that community element, and face to face interaction. We are allowing big (foreign) companies and huge corporations to avoid paying taxes, whilst ushering in an era of low-paid, lower-skilled jobs in windowless, soulless warehouses and production lines. Taking money out of the UK.
In the last month or so I have stopped buying from Amazon. I have gone out and bought what I needed from physical stores instead. And found prices to be reasonable and comparable to those you would find on Amazon. Admittedly I have found some items online and used click and collect - another invention resulting from online retail.
Would it be the worst thing if we went back to our old ways of shopping? Reinvigorate our high streets, bring life back to our communities, give people more interactive and fulfilling jobs, keep more of our money in the UK. Perhaps the government would need to look at tax avoidance of UK firms, but that's far easier than the tax affairs of international, multinational company's.
end.
In the last month or so I have stopped buying from Amazon. I have gone out and bought what I needed from physical stores instead. And found prices to be reasonable and comparable to those you would find on Amazon. Admittedly I have found some items online and used click and collect - another invention resulting from online retail.
Would it be the worst thing if we went back to our old ways of shopping? Reinvigorate our high streets, bring life back to our communities, give people more interactive and fulfilling jobs, keep more of our money in the UK. Perhaps the government would need to look at tax avoidance of UK firms, but that's far easier than the tax affairs of international, multinational company's.
end.
Community Updates
23 Comments
sorted byInvesting in shop Bazaar’s is something positive that is something I look forward to seeing.
I visit a few towns often, they are not local but well worth a visit, they offer free parking and it takes the stress away from parking fines.
Lets not forget the increased chance of being mugged or being fed fake notes, and the obligatory morons who consider the precincts to be racetracks for electric scooters.
Whilst Amazon is a behemoth of the retail world, the chains and owbers are no different in their attitude to staff and customers. Look at Philip Green. How many chains have siblings fighting for the same money, increasing their surface area to distract you from the competition (Curry's/Dixon's/pcworld/car phone warehouse). How many of the millionaires behind these names are not utilising the same practices as Amazon in tax avoidance, or buying off MPs?
The 2 man butcher shop cannot compete with the in store counter that is open 12 hours per day, and people are too soft about not wanting to know where their meat came from, and so they frequent the sanitised supermarket butcher.
We, the consumer were responsible for the "loss of the High Street", but at what cost to our pocket do we really want to traipse around a multitude of shops, having to pay for parking without knowing the goods are in stock? We get precious little time to ourselves, and to have to spend our free time racing with thousands of others with the same goal, and only a day and a half to get it done.
We killed the little shops, with our "need" to have things now. The local governments also have to shoulder the blame as they raise parking charges by 30% per year, and increasing the business rates exponentially of the small shops so that they can't compete. Councils want to deal with one company, covering the largest area possible, as it means less individuals and paperwork to deal with, and a guaranteed income.
Will we ever see the small shops again? Not while they have to charge 20%+ over what we can get from the likes of Amazon, with delivery included for the sake of the cost of a couple of hours parking per month. (edited)
Best example..banks make billions.. Yet they continue to shut branches even though old ladies want them because they can make more money with them shut. (and by doing so they put more nails into coffins of the businesses that bank with them).
I have lived in my area for about 30 years. In that time about a dozen medium / large supermarkets have opened near me. I can now get to about 12 medium and large supermarkets in a 3 mile radius.
At first as more and more supermarkets opened the small grocers in the High Street closed.
Then the supermarkets got butchers and the high street butchers closed.
The same happened to flower shops, card shops, record shops, electrical shops (TVs etc), off licenses and so on. all of them went from the High Street.
Now all the large supermarkets sell clothes so many of the high street clothes shops have closed.
My High Street has lost loads of shops. We used to have a Halfords and a Dixons when we moved here and they went to the Retail Park that was built.
Other shops that went were a record shop, a TV/electrical shop, a greengrocers, two butchers, a card shop, a flower shop, as well as Woolworths, Adams, Blockbusters, Office World and many more.
Our High Street now consists of about 12 charity shops, and about 5 Turkish barbers as well as a few banks.
Most of the other shops are now take aways (chicken, pizza etc) plus cafes and restaurants with a few empty units.
This is not all the fault of online shopping (though that does not help).
If you have a area where people can sit and chill, again, people would decide to go and then would end up going to a few shops, increasing footfall.
What annoys me is the lack of customer care in store - just take my last car purchase as an example - we arranged a test drive, arrived 15 minutes early to be told the car was in the garage for body repair - it took them 2 hours to tell us that (I think the sales guys tried to hoodwink us into buying a higher priced car as they gave a test drive in 3 other cars!)
Also other experiences such as CEX or GAME - you go in (usually after a deal posted on here) only to be told to check online!
I don't mind so much the lost of the human interaction - I miss the ability to physically touch (look, feel & try) the actual products before buying. i also miss the "in store bargains" . My local ToysRus used to have a "reduced bin" of shop soiled products and I picked up quite a few bargains that way...
I was prepared to pay more and support local shops but hunting for specific parts was near possible and if they can get it in will take a week or more. Going on line gave me so much more choice and options and it gets delivered next day. No drama, no parking fines, cheaper, so much faster.
Physical bricks and mortar stores are under tremendous pressure with overheads, staff costs, security and the level of shoplifting. If these issues are not addressed then all stores will close and it will be online only. The only shops on most high streets are charity shops, nail bars, hair dressers, fast food takeaway aways, estate agents, betting shops. (edited)
I love wasting time to go out, search high and low for parking, then having to pay for that pleasure. To arrive in store with glum looking staff, no stock of the item you're looking for at double the price of the online alternative to finally go back to your car and see some kids have dinged it.
Oh how I miss that!
The same thing is happening to them, why cry over it?
As for, "interactive and fulfilling jobs", having done short stints in retail, I for one would never use those terms to describe the 9 - 5 drudgery of shuffling round a shop, tidying up after and dealing with the public.