So much business reporting these days is fretting about the American “consumer” and what he or she is up to at any given moment. From which generalizations are made, and conclusions pronounced. (What it’s all supposed to mean is another question.)
For example, last week the Associated Press reported that online shopping was reaching such a critical mass with American shoppers that “icons of the traditional mall … face an increasingly uncertain future.” The article makes blanket statements such as, “Shoppers who once crowded malls are now ordering on phones, computers and tablets, siphoning sales from physical stores, which face growing pressure to reinvent their businesses.”
Others are attributed, such as: “Online is cannibalizing the store business,” said Marshal Cohen, chief industry analyst at the NPD Group.
In other words, it’s all very, very dire. But a recent Bloomberg View commentary happened to note that in the U.S., where more than $200 billion of goods are sold online per year, the figure represents less than 10 percent of the total retail volume. (The global average is about 5 percent.) So it’s hard to swallow that the internet is somehow “cannibalizing” the store business. Especially when any store worth its weight also has an online presence and is already “reinventing” their business.
At the same time, another article (on hothardware.com) worries that consumers aren’t shopping online enough. A National Telecommunications &Information Administration survey of more than 41,000 households found that nearly half (45 percent) of the respondents said they now avoid certain online activities over concerns about privacy and security. Conducting banking online and buying goods and services online, both of which might lead to identity theft, were the top concerns.
Bad experiences back up the fears: Nineteen percent of Internet-using households — representing nearly 19 million households — reported that they had been affected by an online security breach, identity theft, or similar malicious activity during the 12 months prior to the July 2015 survey, according to the NTIA. The study authors recommend widespread deployment of strong encryption along with other security measures to get “more Americans using online services.”
Trying to find middle-of-the-road business reporting is becoming more difficult, possibly in part because headlines (and to a lesser extent articles) online have to be written in such a way to garner a “click” from online readers who are bombarded with dozens of headlines at a time. Sensationalizing things helps with that. Reporting that people still mainly shop in stores, while online sales are also growing, isn’t as “sexy” as reporting “malls are in a free-fall.”
Meanwhile, people go about their shopping, online or not, and businesses go about their business, smartly unconcerned with pronouncements by the media and business “experts” and “analysts.”
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