Traditional Shopping Still has Its Place

by Aishani Misra

Imagine it is your sibling’s birthday but they live far away and on top of that it’s snowing hard. Lucky for you, you can just open your computer, and boom a gift is being delivered to your sibling. Happy you and happy sibling.

E-commerce is all the rage, bringing in $200 billion in revenue. But what will happen to traditional shopping? Popular stores were already closing their doors and COVID is not making it any easier. According to a CNBC news article, there have already been 8,741 store closings in 2020. These stores include Bed Bath & Beyond, Macy’s, JCPenney, Victoria’s Secret, Jo-Ann Stores, Party City, and countless others.

There are many reasons that contribute to all these stores closing. One reason is COVID obviously, but there seem to be more pros to online shopping than to traditional shopping. Online shopping can save time and money. Traveling by car uses up gas which means paying more. When shopping online people can also have more variety in size, color, design, and much more. Comparing and saving prices is much easier online. For example, the cart icon on websites shows how much money one is spending. Going back to the example with your siblings’ birthday, buying and giving gifts is much easier. There are some cons such as not being able to physically see the product, unable to try the product on, and shipping money. But there seem to be more pros than cons to the wonders of online shopping.

Traditional shopping may not be as popular today, but there are pros and cons to this type of commerce too. Pros would be the exact opposite of e-commerce. You can try on clothes, feel the material, get the product immediately, and know exactly where the origin of the product is. As there are pros there are cons. Some include loss of time, unable to compare prices, and not being able to just search up products. In my opinion, another advantage of traditional shopping is bonding time with family and friends. You can’t get that same experience from home.

What does this mean for the future? According to Coresight Research, 25% of U.S. malls are expected to close down in a span of five years. The rapid spread of the Coronavirus is forcing people to stay home, which means less shopping in stores. Entertainment and food companies such as Dave & Busters, iFly indoor skydiving, and Cheesecake factory are lessening their dependence on retail stores to keep them alive. Malls rated C and below are most likely to start closing their doors first. But that doesn’t mean luxury malls are not at risk.

Property owners are finding a problem: what should they do with the closed malls/stores? Simon Property Group, one of the biggest mall owner companies, is in the process of turning the area of closed stores into places for Amazon to store their products.

Some popular online retail stores and the amount of money they bring into the U.S. today include Amazon ($21.33 billion in 2020), Shein ($21 billion in 2020), eBay ($37.53 billion in 2020), and countless other stores.

When I look at E-commerce versus traditional commerce, I like traditional shopping better. I believe this because stores are an excellent place to exercise because you are walking around a lot and it is a great place to spend time with family.