Interesting article, Eli Greenblat seems a tad bitterOriginally Posted by 1AZRAEL1
The only thing that will bring customers back is an improvement on prices. I'm sick of hearing retailers having a sook over the cost of upkeep when it really is such a small percentage of the issue.
For example, when I worked at Harvey Norman I was able to see the cost of all the items that came into the store. I found that quite often prices that the store paid the suppliers were more than what Umart was selling the exact same product for to the public.
Now I would imagine that Umart, being a bricks and mortar store as well as an online business, would share a lot the costs that Harvey Norman has to endure like rental, the cost of hiring staff and insurance etc. So why is it that they seem to be able to stay afloat? Cheaper suppliers combined with moving large amounts of stock at a low percentage markup is my guess.
All Interactive Distribution, a major supplier to stores like HN and Gametraders, still sells new release console games for around the $70 mark depending on the title. Why would anyone bother purchasing from stores that can't afford to offer it for less than the $60-ish dollars I would pay to get the same item from Zavvi, OzGameShop, The Hut or even eBay? This is the reason that Gametraders has begun to lean heavily on parallel importing.
Fix the suppliers, fix the biggest part of the problem IMO.
Reply With Quote