Brick and mortar stores are still just fine (or better thanks to Yuppies). Malls are getting decimated by Amazon and cultural trends against malls. The 80s suburban world where malls are the place to hangout is fading fast.
One of the statistics that kinda blows me away, on Boxing Day, the largest mall in the city (which is still tiny by American standards) is visited by over 25% (>100000 people) of the population of the city.
(on the other hand, I know of two other local malls that are jam packed at all hours of the day, so I don't know what that says)
Rackspace just moved their HQ into one of these dead malls[1], which is highly interesting.
[0] http://deadmalls.com/ [1] http://www.planetizen.com/node/59071
I encourage everyone to check out their local dead mall, especially one that you visited when you were a kid. Lots of strange nostalgia to be had for sure. Bring rollerblades or a skateboard if you want to get adventurous.
It was like I was in a research lab's clean room or something.
* They can specialize more than Walmart can, and be real experts in what they are selling, which Walmart is never really going to do.
* They can focus on quality and not compete on price.
* They can get to know their customers and their town in a way that Walmart can't.
Amazon is pretty similar to Walmart from that point of view and the same approach would likely work.
Interesting book, BTW, I reviewed it here:
http://davids-book-reviews.blogspot.it/2013/07/sam-walton-ma...
PS: I'm also glad that the thought of a destructive internet has gone from "luddite talk" to "idea worth examining". I've read Paul Krugman talking about this a while ago for whatever is worth.
Again, anecdotal, but I wonder if this frees up parts of the workforce to explore other employment they might have not pursued otherwise.
Something I've noticed is that there seems to be a revitalization in the last few years in more..."traditional"...employers (meaning not in the tech industry) all populated by the kinds of folks you'd probably expect to see in the tech industry: chocolate makers, independent sandwich shops, bike shops, etc.
It's almost like the megacorps in the retails world have ignored certain market segments that are now populated by tons of small boutique shops.
There are so many places where malls are thriving. A few years ago, I used to live in a different city, and at Christmas time I'd have to take a different road to work, because just driving by the mall made my commute twice as long, if not more because of the traffic. On a weekday. Taking the long way was much quicker.
The stuff on everyone's Macy's registry can be purchased elsewhere for half the price or less. I've looked.
In one mall, I walked through a Macy's that may have had only 5 shoppers (I'm reserving "customers" as we weren't one until we actually bought something) in the entire store. The tile floor of the store was crumbling, wallpaper was peeling, everything felt old and ancient. I didn't want to be there.
In one mall, there was an entire wing of the mall that was almost completely abandoned and probably 30-40% of the mall was vacant store fronts. The food court I used to spend hours in consisted of a McDonald's and a Chinese fast food place. I remember years ago when it hosted a dozen different places, all with long lines. Getting a table to eat at required a friend to go reserve a table for you. These days? 3 people eat big macs in an empty large echoy room. It used to be the social center for the town, today it's nearly abandoned.
Amazon and other online shopping venues decimated these brick and mortar shopping venues. And it's not clear that it's generating the same amount of raw revenue in return either. It's definitely annihilating retail jobs in a way that Walmart could never hope to approach, yet it's rarely if ever discussed. At best, retail Macy's jobs are being replaced with contract warehouse work at a local fulfillment center, but automation and the loss of the requirement to interface with the customer means these places only require a fraction of the employees to move the same volume of inventory.
I don't know if the pendulum will ever swing the other way. My wife for example, buys clothes almost exclusively on-line. It's almost unthinkable that she does this, you want to try on clothes after all. But she overbuys a little, and only goes to the physical store to return items that don't fit or she doesn't like. The once proud storefront has been turned into the return counter in the customer service center. Why? "I don't like dealing with all the crowds and it's such a hassle to go there to see if things are on sale, I'll just check the web site every few days instead."
About the only brick and mortar we hit with any regularity these days is Costco, and that's largely because their wine selection is cheaper than online and very nearly always well selected and we can buy bulk toiletries and cleaning supplies at a discount.