Shopping Centers Today -> September 2003
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WEIGHT GAIN
Despite some high-profile failures a few years back, online grocery
retail continues to grow. Forrester Research estimates that shoppers
will buy $3.7 billion worth of food and drink over the Internet
this year, up about 40 percent over last year. And now Amazon.com
plans to get in on the act, by developing a storefront for a variety
of food retailers, reports
The Wall Street Journal. Amazon
will handle the ordering, much as it does for several nonfood retailers,
such as Toys ‘R’ Us and Target, while the purveyors themselves
will ship the food.
OWNING UP
E-tailers doing business in California will find security breaches
more embarrassing in the future. A state law that came into effect
in July requires companies to notify any customer whose personal information
might have been obtained by a hacker. The bill, which was held up
early last year, breezed through after hackers broke into the state
government network, stealing personal information on 265,000 state
workers — including all 120 legislators, reported
The Boston
Globe. At press time Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., was considering
introducing a similar bill at the federal level, the paper reported.
CLICKS TO BRICKS
Levenger Co., which sells stationery products through catalogs and
over the Internet, is opening a shop in the Marshall Field’s
flagship department store in Chicago this month. The retailer, which
will pay rent, is one of several boutiques coming there, including
shirtmaker Thomas Pink and stationery retailer Papyrus.
MAGIC NUMBERS
Amazon.com says the latest Harry Potter book broke a record for
sales of a new product this summer. More than 1.3 million copies
of
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix had been ordered
worldwide from the online retail giant prior to the book’s
June 21 release. The previous preorder record was held by
Harry
Potter and the Goblet of Fire, the fourth book in the series,
which drew more than 410,000 orders worldwide.
TAXES: ANYBODY CARE?
Consumers will be more reluctant to buy online if they have to pay
sales taxes, according to a recent survey, but that contradicts
an earlier study’s conclusion that shoppers couldn’t care
less about the issue (
SCT, March 2003). More than 60 percent
of respondents to an
Investor’s Business Daily-sponsored
survey (conducted by BizRate.com) said they would think twice about
buying online if forced to pay taxes. But a Jupitermedia survey
done early this year found that only 46 percent of online consumers
even know they can evade taxes by shopping online.
CAR E-DEALERS
Nearly one in four car sales in the United States will take place
over the Internet by 2007, according to a report by online research
company Jupiter Research. The most popular site is eBay Motors (300,000
used cars sold last year), while CarsDirect.com sells the most vehicles,
though it doesn’t disclose numbers, according to Jupiter.
NORTH KOREA’S NEW CAREER
Desperate for foreign currency, North Korea (Democratic People’s
Republic) has set up an online mall offering everything from accordions
to ginseng, from mushrooms to machine tools. The site, operated
through North Korea’s embassy in Austria, is “aimed at
promoting trade, exchange and cooperation between the DPR and foreign
countries of all continents,” reads an introduction at the
top of the Web page.
