“Clicks n Mortar” Is The Future Says Paris Conference

Monash University’s Australian Centre For Retail Studies is presenting at the World Retail Conference in Paris this month and reports that 68 percent of retailers say stores remain the most important channel for shoppers and one in three plan to increase their store footprint

Reuters report from the conference - "I am totally convinced that click and mortar is the future," said Georges Plassat, the head of world number two retailer Carrefour. Top retailers were considering how best to integrate their physical stores with online. One of the earliest traditional store proponents of a strong online presence is UK’s John Lewis department store. A quarter of John Lewis’ sales are online and they plan a significant expansion of their traditional store network. However they claim that nearly two-thirds of their sales have an online component through the use of a whole range of technology including mobile phones.
Market traders have plenty of the “Mortar” component in their structure but not too much of the “Clicks”. The challenge for traders is letting customers communicate with them through technology. It is a whole new form of interaction.
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