How Webrooming May Save Brick and Mortar Stores

For the technologically-savvy out there, it seemed like a time when the maximum available level of smug was called for.

With the rise of online shopping, and the subsequent gain in mobile shopping, it started to look like the whole practice of “going to a store” would be rendered as obsolete as the buggy whip or the 5.25-inch floppy disk.

But that was before a new practice arose that combined the best of both worlds and gave us “webrooming,” a practice that may ultimately keep the mall open.

Webrooming refers to a practice that probably should have been more intuitive than it turned out to be, but the fact that it’s starting to catch on is particularly noteworthy.

With webrooming, essentially, people realized that the best parts of both sides of the shopping equation could be had all at the same time. Webrooming is the parallel concept of “showrooming,” a practice in which users would go to a brick and mortar store to get hands-on with a product—see how something fit, looked, felt, or operated—and then turned to the Internet instead to get the best deals.

This was a practice that worked perfectly for everyone but the brick and mortar stores; said stores, in order to provide the things that made showrooming work, had to keep the lights and the heat on and the staff paid and perform all those overhead-related functions that cost money. These in turn were costs online vendors could save on and pass the savings on to the customer.

But there was always one fatal flaw to online and mobile shopping: a lack of immediacy.

Yes, users could buy just about anything online and have it shipped right to the front door… but it took about a week, maybe more, to actually get the item.

In some cases, shipping costs were equal to the price of the product itself, and even more in other cases.

Thus webrooming was born; buy the product online from the comfort of home and pajamas, then voluntarily give up said comfort for just a few minutes to go to the nearest store and pick it up.

That was a combination that really opened things up; brick and mortar jobs were comparatively safe, just somewhat transferred; instead of selling things, the things in question were already sold.

Indeed, some stores even began to institute price-match guarantees, ensuring that users would not only get convenience and immediacy, but also cost savings.

With these three points in hand, businesses could better assure customers of the best deal, and that was a point that made for plenty of value.

Naturally, this has required some changes in the way companies do business, but the key points remain.

Now, brick and mortar stores are just as much a necessity as ever, but not for shopping so much as for gathering the product of said shopping. That’s an unusual diversion, and one that has the potential to shake up a lot of retail as we know it.

But it may well be that the death of the brick and mortar outlet has been deeply exaggerated, and the end result ultimately proved that change may be the only true constant of technological development.