My wife sent me out to get a CD earlier today and I was more than happy to walk into our local Best Buy and browse. While looking at the computers, headphones, televisions and media I started to wonder how long it would be before this type of store disappears. After all we already lost Circuit City and Ultimate Electronics. In fact I recently read an article that described Best Buy as Amazon’s brick & mortar store. People browse electronics at Best Buy and then buy them online at Amazon (or the cheapest online option.) Does not sound like a winning proposition for Best Buy!
We have already seen a huge decline in video stores. They have been replaced by more convenient options. This got me wondering if I would miss electronic/gadget stores? A wealth of information is available all over the internet for any gadget you can dream of, but is it really possible that we could completely lose our ability to walk into a store and pick the gadget up? Turn on the television and play with the remote? Play with a stereo receiver? How close do you think we are to seeing these stores become nothing more than memories like Hollywood Video?
Further, assuming these stores do disappear, where would we go for our gadget fix? Is engadget enough? Could you ever imagine a day where you would pay to browse gadgets? If Best Buy were to disappear and you had zero options for physically browsing televisions would you pay to enter a store that was focused on product demonstration and trial? A gadget amusement park. If not do you think product demonstration and trial is something that we lose entirely or do you expect new alternatives? New brick and mortar options?
