Comment
Comment features expert perspectives and thought leadership from across the UK retail industry. This section includes opinion pieces, analysis, and commentary from senior retail executives, analysts, and sector specialists on the commercial, strategic, and operational forces shaping retail. Retail Sector’s Comment coverage explores issues such as consumer behaviour shifts, technology adoption, sustainability, regulation, and leadership — providing retail professionals with authoritative insight to inform decision-making and strategic planning.
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Apr- 2018 -9 April
What is the ‘Commitment and Consistency’ principle?
A few months ago, I saw a watch online that I liked. I went to the brand’s website and looked at their collection. I followed them on Instagram. I showed the watch to my partner and told him I liked it. But then I thought, I should shop around. So…
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6 April
Caring consumers
We all know that global e-commerce is growing rapidly; recent figures have revealed that retail ecommerce sales are expected to grow to €3.65 trillion (£3.187tn) by 2021, up from $1.05tn (£917bn) or 246.15 % in 2014. Despite the major positives of the industry’s fast growth, ecommerce is having an increasingly…
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5 April
Embracing advanced, real-time analytics
The last few months have presented a challenge for traditional bricks-and-mortar retailers in the UK. High street sales have continued to struggle in a difficult trading environment, leading to a number of high-profile retail casualties – notably companies such as Toys R Us and Maplin. All UK Toys R US…
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4 April
The role artificial intelligence has to play in retail
There’s no doubt about it; the retail sector is in the middle of a revolution. While customer service has always been important, it’s customer convenience that’s now king. PwC’s 2018 consumer insights survey found that 40% of online shoppers would pay more for same-day delivery and 62% expected their orders…
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3 April
Try-before-you-buy is causing a ‘returns tsunami’
Try-before-you-buy (TBYB) is a new shopping trend that enables customers to order multiple items before deciding what they’d like to keep. There is no up-front cost; shoppers simply pay for items they keep after a certain number of days – usually 30 days. They return unwanted items and are never…
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Mar- 2018 -29 March
Millennials – The leaders of the retail revolution
Millennials – the largest generation since the Baby Boomers – will come into their own by 2020. Born between 1980 and 2000, this group represents the world’s first truly digital generation. Already a potent force in today’s society, millennial purchasing power will continue to gain momentum, with recent Accenture research…
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28 March
The bull’s eye for cyber criminals: PoS Systems
Point of Sale (Pos) systems that take payments for goods and services for the hospitality and retail industries really serve as the point-of-strike for cyber criminals stealing credit card information. Applebee’s, a popular restaurant chain, is the latest to find malware on their PoS systems that infected more than 160…
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27 March
GDPR could be the best thing to happen to your customer experience
On 25 May 2018, the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) will come into force across the EU. It is the biggest change to data protection laws in Europe since the 1995 introduction of the European Union (EU) Data Protection Directive. Since its creation in 1995, the amount of digital information…
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26 March
Imagined ownership: four steps to nudge customers closer to purchase
Lately, when opening the Asos app on my phone, I’ve been struck by how keenly they’re pushing their ‘try before you buy’ scheme. “30 days: no fees, no interest,” the app boasts. And just the other day, a colleague told me about arriving home to find her husband trying on…
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23 March
Gender pay gap reporting: Why you should see it as an opportunity
With just less than a month until the gender pay gap (GPG) reporting deadline, less than 15% of eligible organisations have published their results, with some experts predicting that a sizeable proportion will fail to make the early-April cut-off. No doubt many employers view GPG reporting as an administrative headache…
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