Monday, January 3, 2011

The online shopping war starts.... now

I look at this report and just think to myself – it figures.

The post Xmas sales have been ABYSMAL, Pre-Xmas was cheaper, it’s like all the major dept stores have decided to deliver a big FU to consumers for not fattening their coffers in the run up to Xmas, and now here’s the confirmation!

Mark my words – this issue will be the R18+ of 2011 – the sort of grass roots reaction that this will generate will be on par with that.

Online sales will kill jobs: retailers
• Blair Speedy
• From: The Australian
• January 04, 2011 12:00AM

AUSTRALIA'S biggest retailers will launch an advertising campaign aimed at pressuring the government to impose GST on all goods bought over the internet.

Retailers, who will pour millions of dollars into the campaign, have warned that thousands of jobs are at risk if the government fails to act.

Taking a leaf from the mining industry, which lobbied effectively against the resource super-profits tax, a coalition of retailers including Myer, David Jones, Harvey Norman and Target, will today begin taking out print ads in a bid to rescue the flagging sector.

Myer chief executive Bernie Brookes criticised the government's announcement of a Productivity Commission inquiry into the taxation of online purchases as a delaying tactic and said urgent action was needed to stop jobs from being lost.

Sluggish retail sales, heavy discounting in the lead-up to the Christmas sales period and a surging Australian dollar have encouraged consumers to shop over the internet, devastating the retail sector.


Check out the full report at the Australian.

The thing that amazes me about this campaign by the retailers - is that they think that simply adding 10% to the cost of imports is going to turn people off buying online. I'm not shopping online for 10% discount, more like a 50% price cut which should give you an indication of the phenomenal markups on some goods sold in this country.

I don't want to see retail jobs lost - but in some sectors you'd be a flaming idiot to not take up the bargains online.

Interestingly the retailers named - mostly mark up their goods to unsustainable levels IMO. Generally speaking if I see something at Myer or David Jones - there's a good bet I'll find it cheaper at Target or Kmart.

Harvey Norman has room to move on price which is good (I like to haggle) and you would think most of the things they sell would be big ticket items like Whitegoods or furniture which would be prohibitive to import, however they're probably taking a beating on Electronics, I hate to tell them but adding a GST ain't gonna change much...