Walmart Vs Amazon Analysis

Imagine a barren landscape. Green is shriveled and ground crumbles at your feet. Strewn nearby is evidence of life but now it deteriorates with each passing month. This is no apocalypse. This is the shopping mall, in the period investors have dubbed as the retail ice-age. Instead of woolly mammoths and saber-tooth tigers going extinct, it is an entirely different species: the brick-and-mortar. As more consumers rely on online shopping, the tension between e-commerce and brick-and-mortar stores will continue to grow.
Monopoly or Myopia: Amazon vs. Wal-Mart

Founded in 1962, Wal-Mart has a long history constituting of over 50 years and a large market share that totals up to $486 billion. (www.corporate.walmart.com) (Hoovers) As a result,

Initial but integral steps such as the information search and the evaluation of alternatives are simplified through technology. In fact, Amazon prides itself so much on this that it even takes priority on its value chain (“definition”) through outbound logistics and service. “We’re not competitor obsessed, we’re customer obsessed,” Bezos explained in a blog post for Salesforce. “We start with what the customer needs and we work backwards.” (SOURCE) With its ability to promise a product in a customer’s hands within 48 hours of ordering, Amazon is not only shaking Wal-Mart’s foundations but all retailers that fall under the brick-and-mortar

In the fashion industry’s case, products may also be used or tried on before making a final purchase. Professors of marketing Kitty Wang and Avi Goldfarb call these factors experimental capabilities. (Wang and Goldfarb 2017) Unfortunately, experimental capabilities are hard to replicate digitally, leaving people to rely on other factors. These may include imagery, reviews (see Making E-Commerce Social), product descriptions, or sometimes intuition. This can make shopping online frustrating, difficult, or at times risky for both the buyer and the seller. In fact, about 30% of items ordered online are returned, with 22% of consumers stating the item(s) they received did not look the same as it was online. (Rudoph 2016) To minimize return rates, in addition to other benefits such as increasing sales and local brand awareness, some businesses have come up with a solution: the pop-up store.
Pop-up stores are “temporary retail spaces that sell merchandise of any kind”. (SOURCE) This type of retailing has existed since the 1990s. During its over twenty years of existence, the pop-up store has branched into different strategic categories, including: the flagship store, the concept store, the mobile, and -- most notably -- the clicks-and-bricks store. Clicks-and-bricks stores are primarily used to promote online stores