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Online Retailing Technology >> Surviving the Amazon Jungle
10/29/2004
www.e-tailing.com), a Chicago-based consulting firm that helps vendors establish eCommerce sites, probably sums it up best:“It’s no secret that for students more so than for the rest of us, the Internet is a huge part of life,” she says. “Enabling more shopping online simply makes sense, and people are finally starting to pay attention to that reality.”
Looking Back
Truth is, etailing has been around since the early ’90s, and came of age as a legitimate form of commerce with the Big Bang—better known as the bookstore behemoth Amazon.com. Under the entrepreneurial guidance of CEO Jeff Bezos, “Earth’s Biggest Bookstore” stocked its Seattle warehouse shelves with more titles than the Library of Congress, shipping books within 24 hours of order. In many cases, Amazon’s 20 to 30 percent discount drove book prices down to the point where, even after shipping, they were cheaper than the same books at the local Borders (now an Amazon affiliate) or Barnes & Noble. Students caught on fast, and logged on to purchase their textbooks and course materials there. In response, Borders and B&N launched their own eStores.
While no national organization at the time charted how much money college students were spending at online bookstores in particular, a 2000 study by eCommerce market research firm Harris Interactive (www.harrisinteractive.com) indicated that US residents between the ages of 18 and 24 were spending almost $4 billion online per year on all kinds of goods. Given these figures, it came as no surprise when college bookstores began to see book sales sag and revenues drop accordingly. We all know what happened next: Bookstore managers resolved to fight back, and many rushed to establish an etailing presence to complement the brick-and-mortar facility, and afford students the convenience of purchasing their books online.
“While these bookstores saw the need to establish etailing sites, many realized that they couldn’t do away with their facilities and become Amazon clones,” says David Rood, director of Media Services at the National Association of College Auxiliary Services (www.nacas.org). “They had to find a middle ground, and they struggled to do it.”
Then, just as bookstores began to get the online bookselling thing down, Amazon morphed into Earth’s biggest everything store, peddling a panoply of products from clothes and electronics to home furnishings and toys. Dozens of other eCommerce sites sprouted, too, and campus bookstore managers were forced to change their eCommerce plans yet again. As we all remember, the transformation was much more difficult; online bookstores now faced the challenge of adding dozens of products, including school merchandise, basic school supplies (notebooks, pens, etc.), and more. To do this, most schools turned to higher education technology vendors such as Sequoia, Nebraska, and Missouri Book Systems (www.mbsbooks.com) for turnkey solutions that enabled them to put their entire physical inventories online.
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