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more competitive on price – which is going
to have an impact on every traditional grocer
that has been able to steal market share
from Whole Foods by offering lower-priced
organics.
Can you imagine what would happen if
Whole Foods announced the day after its
deal with Amazon has been completed
that every Amazon Prime member gets a 5
percent discount there?
Whole Foods has been slow and clumsy in its
ability to take customer data and translate it
into meaningful customer communications
that can then translate into sales... but one
has to imagine this is low-hanging (organic)
fruit for Amazon. They'll fix that fast.
Subscribe and Save for Whole Foods
products? Ordering via the Echo/Alexa
system and Dash buttons? One has to
imagine that all this stuff is on the table.
And there will be no dithering – just incisive
analysis and fast execution…with what at
Amazon they call a Bias for Action.
There may be some Whole Foods customers
who will see this acquisition as a negative,
but not many, I'd guess…because I'd be
willing to bet there is a ton of overlap
between Prime members and Whole Foods
customers. (Amazon Lockers at Whole
Foods stores may be as commonplace as
checkout lanes.)
Tom Furphy is absolutely right.
Big, traditional, incumbent retailers
have to wake up. “Today is Day One,” is
the Amazon mantra, and the folks there
are moving fast. If you do not have an
effective and efficient digital/e-commerce/
automation strategy, you are facing nine
miles of bad road.
By the way…When I write that traditional
retailers have to respond, I'm not
just talking about Amazon's specific
competitive operations, but also the broader
understanding of competitive and consumer
realities that Amazon reflects. Because there
actually is something going on here that is
a lot bigger than Amazon. (If you doubt me,
think about it the next time you go to
a Circuit City, RadioShack, Blockbuster
or Borders.)
It also is critical to keep one thing in mind –
Jeff Bezos thinks long-term. In doing
this deal, he has crystalized in his mind
how Whole Foods fits into the Amazon
ecosystem in 2020 and beyond.
The question that traditional retailers in all
segments ought to be asking is this:
What's next?
You can't just sit. You can't wait for
something to go bump.
But if you do, I can guarantee one thing. You
won't like it. Not one little bit.
■
VIEWPOINT
“The game is changing fast, he said, and
traditional grocers simply seem incapable of
keeping up – they take too long to make the
kinds of decisions they need to make in order to
compete effectively.”
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ALABAMA GROCER |