Retailers have been put under extraordinary pressure for the past 2 years, and forced them to adapt to somewhat irreconcilable constraints, as outlined by David Bosshart, the former CEO of the GDI. How to deal with customers’ expectations of immediate satisfaction while, at the same time, they also expect from retailers commitments toward the environment and the society that are somewhat conflicting with this? What shall retailers pursue: long-term value by emphasizing their brand (but at the risk of running out of cash in the meantime), or compete with the “tech titans” for convenience and speed, not even knowing if they stand a chance?

The guest speakers each provided some insights and elements of reflection to answer this extraordinarily complex question:

• Sucharita Kodali, from Forrester Research, insisted on the fact that retailers had an opportunity to regain control over tech titans, or at least generate a new opportunity, by looking at alternative sources of revenue based on what they know how to do, just like what Amazon, Google or Facebook do,
• The CEOs of Hornbach Baumarkt (German DYI group), Denner (Swiss discount supermarkets) and Tegut (German supermarkets) discussed about power decentralization, trusting teams, considering societal evolutions to predict the future of business, and dealing with innovation with new stores concepts,
• The full e-commerce value chain was also represented, from Obsess which proposes to brands a different experience when it comes to e-commerce with virtual stores, Reflaunt, a resale facilitator, bookshop.org which aims at competing with Amazon on their original markets, books, or the legendary Ben Evans who gave his views on the evolution of tech and how it allowed the retail business to “unbundle”,
• Sustainability was also a topic of choice, with the CEO of Ecoalf (sustainable brand) and Green Pea (the first “green retail park”, opened last year in Turin, Italy) presenting their visions and actions.

The video captions are available here:

-    Link: <https://www.gdi.ch/en/71st-international-retail-summit-password-protected-area>

-    Password: IHT2021_ppa

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Crespin

Evans

farinetti

gutberlet

Hunter

Irminger

kodali