Memo: The eCommerce Advantage Shifts

The article’s title reads, “Why e-commerce disruptors are trading like brick and mortar dinosaurs.” Our position is that for many in retail’s old guard, life finds a way.

The dinosaur comparison is thanks to a new report from The Information, which has tracked stock prices for Farfetch, 1stDibs, The RealReal, Stitch Fix, Rent the Runway, and ThredUp, and has painted a picture of a bursting bubble, declaring “e-commerce is on sale.” Each company that The Information mentioned are digital natives that debuted on the market in the past two years and have since seen their valuations tumble and their stock prices fall. After a pandemic boom for some, many have seen growth taper off. Now, some of them are looking for the exit by seeking acquisition partners. For others, consolidation has already begun. South Korea’s Naver acquired Poshmark, which just went public in 2021. Here is a summary from The Information:

Several members of the group, including ThredUp, Poshmark, Wish and Rent the Runway, went public last year as overall market valuations were peaking. Underlying their public debuts was investor confidence that the pandemic had triggered a permanent shift in shopper behavior toward buying more online. But the timing was off. As lockdowns have eased, growth in online shopping has slowed sharply—to just 6.8% year over year in the first two quarters of this year, from the 30%-plus growth rates seen starting in the second quarter of 2020, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. Even in 2019, before Covid-19, growth rates hovered between 12% and 18%.

The advantage once maintained by retail’s newer generation of online marketplaces has subsided, at least temporarily. Many of those retailers enjoyed high-profile IPOs in the past two years (or private market, secondary rounds). Now, they are struggling to keep pace in an economy that has begun to favor brick-and-mortar retailers like Target and Walmart. In some ways, the dinosaurs are out-innovating the innovators – they are disrupting the disruptors.

It’s not just Target and Walmart. Department store-era retailers, once known for foot traffic and mall real estate, have invested heavily in e-commerce operations. This includes Macy’s, Saks, and Kohl’s. But even with improved omnichannel operations by fashion-based, traditional retailers, the inventory glut has influenced the depth of discounts and the frequency of pricing promotions seen at many of these store. These inventory overruns aren’t universal, however, for retailers that also sell appliances and consumer packaged goods, inventory is more stable than what is seen in fashion retail. It is the full marketplace that is in the better position to survive the up hill climb that seems to be ahead. In Inventory Changes, I explained:

To dig out from under the excess inventory, promotions and long-term storage of excess inventory will likely be necessary for affected retailers. This is a tough pill to swallow for big box companies. Target and Walmart can offset less in-demand sales items with consistently high performing categories like grocery and household necessities.

Emerging online marketplaces were supposed to change the way people shopped forever. I believe that they taught consumers how to interact with retailers online just as the dinosaurs became successful online retailers themselves. In a way, the new generation is at the disadvantage. Single-channel retail is nearing its extinction point for many.

It’s a turn for the worse for the modern retailers who had hoped that by doing things differently than their department store predecessors, they would write new rules to retail and tap into a newfound customer energy at the same time. But technology is expensive, especially when you factor in higher-than-average customer acquisition costs, logistics shortfalls, razor thin product margins. Profitability for these companies has been difficult to maintain. Now, they are finding themselves in a position that may appear like the dinosaurs they tried to disrupt.

Going into a volatile holiday shopping season, the “dinosaurs” are better positioned to earn more market share than the digitally-natives. Shoppers have inflation and budgetary restrictions front of mind. Traditional retailers are dealing with an inventory glut that is going to lead to deep discounts and frequent promotions. These are magnets to consumers who prefer the best deal over ease of purchase during times of distress. It’s a sign of the times for the retail industry that’s gone back to basics: availability, promotions and accessibility.

But when the inventory glut is resolved, the retailers that have invested the most in their eCommerce capabilities are positioned to succeed because omnichannel availability provides the best customer experience. Additionally, these retailers are drawing in digitally native brands who need to unlock wholesale revenue. Layer in promotions on top of that. In an early October report, we looked at how Walmart was readying its inventory levels for the upcoming holiday season, in part by cracking down on brands who couldn’t meet fulfillment requirements:

The brands have become more replaceable while the retailers have become more selective. Walmart, with its vast store network and supply chain capabilities, could become the dominant marketplace this holiday season and beyond. Brands are recognizing that they need the mass retailer to survive.

This year has reinforced Target, Walmart and Amazon’s positions as industry leaders, as already proven by DTC brands hearty embrace. Now, the modern retailers are finding themselves on the backside in the industry that they set out to disrupt. These eCommerce marketplace retailers will recover and / or live on in some form, especially as the economy recovers and consumers are less incentivized to shop promotions at retailers with inventory gluts. But Target and Walmart have become as critical to the online retail engine as Amazon appears to be. Very few predicted that in 2009 when this “DTC” era began, this present time can feel like an ice age to those who were reliant on simpler times and greener pastures.

By Web Smith | Edited by Hilary Milnes with art by Alex Remy and Christina Williams

Member Brief: Inventory Glut(tony)

Jie Zhang, the professor of marketing at University of Maryland’s School of Business recently explained two key factors that contribute to the current inventory glut facing many retailers. These factors have combined to reduce shipping prices and increase inventories in warehouses as retailers like Nike have invested heavily in reducing exposure to physical retail. The timing couldn’t be worse. These are the four points contributing to the current state of the retail economy according to Zhang:

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Memo: TikTok’s Job Listing

In a recent report on TikTok’s ambitions, we ignored commerce altogether to focus on its advertising ambitions and that was a mistake. While the ByteDance offshoot spars with Apple for the eighth largest advertiser in the united states, they’ve proven that they’re not going to be reliant on advertising alone to continue building its linear commerce kingdom. TikTok just might be able to succeed where other social media apps before it have struggled and even failed.

The video-sharing app, which has exploded in usership and cultural sway in the past two years, is planning its eCommerce strategy and signs point to it being a hefty investment, and TikTok Shop is poised to be a significant revenue engine for the platform which has already quickly built a massive advertising business.

A job posting for a business solutions and merchant development manager for a global fulfillment center is a signal that it’s planning on becoming an eCommerce platform in addition to a social media app. The job description reads: “With millions of loyal users globally, we believe TikTok is an ideal platform to deliver a brand new and better e-commerce experience to our users. We are looking for passionate and talented people to join our global fulfillment centre team, together we can build an e-commerce ecosystem that is innovative, secure and intuitive for our users.”

That’s just one of more than a dozen job postings relating to eCommerce and fulfillment posted by TikTok in the last two weeks, according to Axios, which reported on these product fulfillment centers on Tuesday. It says that TikTok is in the process of creating “an eCommerce supply chain system that could directly challenge Amazon”:

According to the job postings, TikTok is looking to build an “international e-commerce fulfillment system” that will include international warehousing, customs clearings and supply chain systems that support domestic e-commerce efforts in the U.S. and cross-border e-commerce efforts. The systems will eventually perform parcel consolidation, along with transporting goods from one stage to the next and managing free returns.

How is TikTok in position to take on Amazon? Well, it comes down to the user base and the mindset that people are in when they’re scrolling the app. While not every video is full of product recommendations, many are. Categories like skincare and beauty have seen products explode after going viral on TikTok – even the most mundane you might find on a CVS shelf, like long standing affordable skincare brand Cerave. Users post hauls from eCommerce brands and sometimes take viewers into Home Goods or Target to explain what they’re buying and why. Products that go viral often sell out. Fashion trends have been born on TikTok, and even videos that aren’t recommending products draw comments asking the creator where they got the sweater they’re wearing or the mixing bowl they’re using. Product inspiration is always in the background of any TikTok video, regardless of the topic.

That’s the key differentiator for TikTok compared to other platforms, which have had a hard time connecting the dots between user engagement and consumerism. Meta has walked back its Instagram shopping push, despite long being pegged as the next online mall, while Amazon’s QVC-like efforts have fallen flat. Snapchat, which has excelled in AR technologies and has partnered with some brands to make use of that, has been slow to build out an eCommerce arm.

For many, it doesn’t work. For TikTok, it might. It has a booming, loyal audience interested in transacting when they’re using the platform. By taking advantage of this, TikTok could connect users and creators directly to product listings and then ship out orders itself, reducing the reliance on middlemen. Right now, most creators will set up link-in-bios to their Amazon storefronts or Like to Know It lists, so anyone in search of a product has to jump through multiple linkouts in order to buy products. The speed with which TikTok is able to make products sell out in stores and online has shown that it’s not a complete hurdle for customers. But linking commerce directly into its platform opens a new revenue stream for TikTok that’s all the more critical now that Apple has clamped down on third-party advertising data collection. Like Meta, TikTok has been reported to be using in-app browsers to collect key data points that are against to skirt around Apple’s recent iOS privacy practices, which have made it more difficult to target ads.

Like other platforms, TikTok needs revenue from eCommerce to make up for that lost ad efficiency. But unlike others, it’s actually positioned to succeed. And this is what makes Meta’s retreat from eCommerce as shocking as TikTok developing teams around shipping and logistics. It’s the era of first-party data and retail media networks. Amazon has proven that native commerce is the best way to collect it.

By Web Smith | Edited by Hilary Milnes with art by Alex Remy and Christina Williams