Retail trend report from ‘Gifts Fair’
Whether you sell in-store, online or across both channels, Melbourne’s shopping environment is always a great and unique inspiration source.
We Melbournians love our laneways and those eateries that are uniquely Melbourne. However, there is something about this city’s retail that’s changing. In this blog, we’ll discuss our first-hand experience at Reed Gifts Fair 2015 to describe the retail revolution that is taking place in our city.
We have just returned back to normal office life from a 5-day Gift Fairs exhibition. What we witnessed at the expo was just great and seriously positive for small retailers and Hike. This is what we learned as exhibitors at the expo:
“Mom-and-Dad” stores are embracing mPOS
Hike’s stand was visited by various small businesses, including micro businesses, mom-and-dad retail stores and even coffee shops. It was so encouraging to find out that all small businesses are welcoming the mobile and iPad POS technologies. The clear trend was that mobile POS systems are ready to replace classical cash registers in our city’s small businesses. It is seen as a way forward for providing a better customer service and improved sales levels.
Some small businesses that visited us and operate from the world-famous Victoria Market were so excited to give iPad register a go. The vendors at Victoria Market are otherwise seen as very traditional vendors. So it was encouraging to see that Melbourne’s small businesses do take technology seriously. Victoria Market has millions of visitors a year and could greatly benefit from the mobile POS technology, delivering the flexibility and ease required by such shopping scenario.
Melbourne’s small businesses differentiate themselves from their large-scale competitors on the basis of product differentiation, exceptional service and feel of being boutique. With cost-effective cloud technologies like Hike, they are ready to also adapt the technology to their advantage.
Established small retailers are adopting cross-channel
The majority of the small but established retailers that visited our stand have clearly accepted the fact that shoppers are channel-independent. For example, one of the visitors who operate 4 stores across Victoria and New South Wales suggested that offering store customers a convenience of ordering online and picking up goods in the physical store is a must have feature for them. They were thrilled to find out that it is one of the basic features offered by Hike.
There were many other retailers still using a traditional POS system, however, ready to adopt a cross-channel approach for their retail business.
Medium-sized chains, shops’ Obsolete POS
It may be a little surprising, but we found that majority of medium-sized businesses were stuck with old-fashioned PC-based POS systems with no near-term plans to change. It may seem a bit contradictory since they are the ones with bigger budgets and likely to benefit the most from this upgrade.
What does it mean?
Large businesses like Myer and David Jones are already using their enterprise software with detailed analytics and reporting features. Small businesses are also covered with a piece of cloud from cost-effective innovations like Hike. However, the ones that are likely to take longer to adapt the change and miss out on the early benefits of the retail revolution are the mid-sized chains.