February 02, 2015

Radio Shack

Oh boy (click here).

It's yet another case that omnichannel cannot solve. You could offer Radio Shack merchandise in an infinite number of channels, and it won't make a difference - Radio Shack was destined to be obliterated by technology. By "digital". The very strategy some would author to save Radio Shack (omnichannel) expedites the demise of the brand.

Digital hates inefficiency.

So it's an interesting dilemma ... digital hates inefficiency, but we're told that we have to digitize the whole business, which creates even more inefficiency and worse, pits a business like Radio Shack against infinity ... an infinite number of the same choices at an infinite number of low prices.

Worse, the omnichannel thesis focuses on pleasing the core customer ... and as we learned in cataloging, this dramatically accelerates the aging of the customer base, thereby skewing the merchandise assortment to merchandise that an aging customer base likes, which precludes younger customers from wanting to buy merchandise, which further accelerates the demise of the business.

We see it over and over and over again.

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