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Bricks & Clicks

Makin’ A List and Checkin’ It Twice

There has been a scramble in recent months as retailers all over the United States have raced to launch or beef up their e-commerce capabilities in time for the holiday shopping season. After the American buying public discovered online shopping during the 1998 holiday season and bumped e-sales to approximately $8 billion for the year, everyone wants a piece of holiday sales expected to run between $6 billion and $9 billion this year.

In anticipation of the expected crush of holiday shoppers hitting the Internet this year, the American Bar Association Section of Business Law unveiled a new Web site, safeshopping.org, intended as a public service to Internet bargain hunters. The Web site offers “plain English” tips on how to conduct safe online transactions.

Shopping on the Net offers significant advantages to consumers, especially those with more discretionary income than time. Benefits include ease, convenience, and often considerable price reductions. Let’s face it — the holiday shopping scene is a zoo at best, and there is great appeal in being able to forego traffic, crowds, harried clerks, and lugging home mountains of packages. There are snickery jokes circulating about consumers shopping from the comfort of their homes while wearing pajamas or underwear. But the key word in the imagined scenario is “shop,” with the underlying understanding that these consumers are spending real money on the Internet instead of in stores.

On September 28, 1999, Store of Knowledge unveiled its online store at storeofknowledge.com. Company Vice President of Information Services Robert Edmison commented, “We are very excited to have a fully integrated, on-line store operating well in advance of the 1999 holiday season. Our new Web store enables us to expand into markets that wouldn’t otherwise be economically viable and to offer our existing customers the added convenience of shopping on-line.”

Paper Warehouse, Inc. went “live” at PartySmart.com in mid-September in order to catch the market for both Halloween and Christmas, which company officials say are the two highest volume party occasions of the year.

Some companies that have existing Web sites are peeling back their layers and opening new sites for their different brand concepts. Such was the case as The Gap launched bananarepublic.com in October. Dayton Hudson has announced that it plans to relaunch its Target.com site and add additional sites for its sister concepts, Mervyns, Dayton’s, Marshall Field’s and Hudson’s. Intimate Brands, Inc., has split its Internet operations into IntimateBrands.com, VictoriasSecret.com, and Limited.com. Spiegel, Inc. e-tails under spiegel.com, eddiebauer.com, newport-news.com, spiegeltronics.com, and ultimate-outlet.com. Phar-Mor Inc. launched its Online Bath & Body Store at shoppharmor.com, in addition to its existing sites, pvsvitamins.com, cyberrxexpress.com, and Pharmorlens.com. Musicland Group, Inc. simply started out the way it meant to end, launching four e-commerce sites for its concepts, samgoody.com, suncoast.com, mediaplay.com and oncue.com. The company estimated it would cost as much as $5 million over two years to complete the venture.

Other companies beefed up existing sites, like Pleasant Company’s americangirl.com. The site had been a popular educational and activity site site with more than 8 million hits a month, but it has been expanded to showcase the entire line of American Girl merchandise, which previously was available only through the company’s catalog and retail site in Chicago. Pleasant Company plans to support its Web site with a national television advertising campaign, which will mark the first TV ad push in the company’s history. Home Depot is in the midst of a phased launch, with a new customer customer-driven site now available at homedepot.com. The interactive site extends the hardware giant’s customer service from stores to the Internet by providing customers with project advice and tips. Tower Records added used CDs to its Web sales offerings at its online store, towerrecords.com. Sears added appliances to its site, sears.com. Kids Stuff, Inc. will add its new catalog concept for infant and children’s shoes, Healthy Feet, to its kidsstuff.com site. Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. increased its selection of toys, electronics, books and holiday decorative items at Wal-Mart.com and future plans include the offering of numerous personal shopping aids, a travel service and a photo center. CompUSA Inc. overhauled its Web site, changing its name from CompUSANet.com to Cozone.com as it upped offerings to include more customer guidance, including in-depth product information and comparisons.

Some companies are combining e-tail efforts with other entities. Petsmart Inc. merged its Web site with rival outfit Idealab in order to create Petsmart.com, which both companies hope will offer a stronger united front in the highly competitive animal products market. The Sports Authority went into partnership at TheSportsAuthority.com with Global Sports Interactive, a Pennsylvania company that plans to launch e-tail businesses for several other sporting goods stores, including sportschalet.com, mcsports.com and the athletesfoot.com. Spiegel, Inc. is providing North American customer service and marketing support for an e-commerce joint venture between Otto Versand, the giant German catalog company, and Harrods, the British department store, at harrods.com. The Wet Seal, Inc. linked up with Seventeen Magazine Online. The Seventeen Web site will have a direct link to Wet Seal’s blueasphalt.com, and vice versa. Nike, Inc. bought into Internet retailer Fogdog Sports in addition to offering its own Nike.com Web site. Kbkids.com is a joint venture between Consolidated Stores Corporation, operator of K*B Toys retail stores, and BrainPlay.com, a major children’s product e-tailer.

Retailers of all kinds have made significant investments into establishing Internet presences. They are betting that the 1999 holiday shopping season will serve as a pilot program for a future where holiday traffic will be measured on modems. If their bets pay off and e-commerce really does cut down holiday hassles, it will not only be traditional retailing that will get a new look. Santa Claus can handle list fulfillment in his underwear, but his elves will need to stock up on Federal Express, UPS and Airborne uniforms.

...T’will be the night before Christmas
And all through the house
Not a computer will be stirring
Not even a mouse...