I am a huge fan of online shopping – I find it a time waster to have to get to a shopping centre, find a parking, deal with unhappy staff who don’t want to necessarily help customers, queue to pay for my goods, pay for my parking and move on to the next activity I have to deal with. I had to go into a large shopping centre the other day to sort out a problem with my phone and I was horrified how many empty shops there were papered up with “An exciting store will be opening shortly???.
I have been grocery shopping online for years and am thrilled to see the growth in this area, I have now ventured into buying health products online and am about to purchase my first clothing item. Sadly it cannot be done right now because my credit card was used in a fraudulent transaction online and it takes a week to get a new card – enforced savings some would say!
What I did not realize was what this kind of shopping is doing to the employment world and have seen a number of articles recently commenting and some of the statistics are scary:
• Over 7.5 million retail jobs could be on the line
• Labour hours could be reduced by 66%
• Thousands of retail stores face closure
• Retail workers account for approximately 10% of the labour force
With the unemployment rates in our country I sincerely hope that the people facing “extinction??? in the retail industry are gearing up for a second career. I think the logistics environment could be a growing one and hope that they are able to re-create themselves to serve a purpose in this industry.