Bricks and Mortar v Online Retailing
In their report entitled “Total Retail 2015: Retailers and the age of Disruption”, PricewaterhouseCoopers surveyed more than 19,000 online shoppers in 19 different countries and across six continents. As online shopping continues to grow at the expense of store visits, four disruptive forces PwC focuses on include the evolution of the store, mobile technology, social networks and demographic shifts.
Of the global sample, 36 per cent shops at a physical store weekly while 20 per cent purchase online via their PC, 11 per cent purchase online via their mobile phone and 10 per cent purchase online via their tablet. In addition, consumers are increasingly using mobile phones in-store to compare prices and product specifications and to seek recommendations from trusted sources.
Security remains a significant issue with 66 per cent of the sample being concerned about having their personal credit information hacked while using a mobile phone.
In terms of shopping online at least once per month, the sample from China takes the gold medal with 96 per cent, and this is followed by the UK and Germany on 81 per cent, India on 78 per cent, while the US comes in fifth place at 72 per cent.
I’ll let Andrew Macken discuss the Alibaba (BABA.US) thesis another day, suffice to say that mobile transactions now account for more than half the company’s gross merchandise value.
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Chief Executive Officer of Montgomery Investment Management, David Buckland has over 30 years of industry experience. David is a deeply knowledgeable and highly experienced financial services executive. Prior to joining Montgomery in 2012, David was CEO and Executive Director of Hunter Hall for 11 years, as well as a Director at JP Morgan in Sydney and London for eight years.
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