Shopping ....virtually!

As kids we'd go to the local bania for grocery shopping and when it came to clothes would visit the market place with parents. That market place would be quite a drive away. The trips would be a few and far between. The first one would be when the school reopened shopping for the uniforms ,rain gear and books, the second one generally would be around Diwali time and of course the third trip would be for the birthday depending on when it fell. These are the first memories of my shopping.

Mom would tell us that during her childhood days they hardly went to any such outings. Infact they'd have the tailor called over to their place, who'd stay put for months together stitching clothes for the entire family, a large joint family in the village having about 30 - 40 members. As for the grocery, they'd have most of it produced right there in their fields and for other things the elder men in the family would do the purchase from the town every quarter or may be just twice a year.

My generation now prefers shopping at malls. In fact the online shopping is picking up too. The advantage being that one can check out products, do window shopping and choose products right from the comforts of one's home. No need to step out and do a hurried shopping, no tension of finding parking space and ofcourse worry about kids running here and there and increasing your shopping bill with absolutely everything they can get their hands on, lets call it play zone and then the food court. 

I don't shop much online, as I think one needs to feel the fabric while purchasing  garments. Other things are fine. At times one ends up getting good deals and combo offers that are irresistible.One may miss this at a store but on the computer, while shopping online the information is conveyed logically and in a such a way that it can't be missed.

It makes me think how will shopping be.... say 15 years on?

Of course most of the shopping will be online. As it was said, being 'born with a silver spoon'... forget spoon the children now are born with the cell phones. I still can't figure out the Angry birds but my children are Pro at them. Take any game on the cellphone, there are hundreds of them coming out each day and kids pick them up so fast. In fact game developer has become a lucrative career. 20 years from now will be the time of these kids who may be professionals and some of them may be new parents. I am imagining them shopping. I am sure most of it would be online and they'd step out only for outings, trekking and may be on a holiday but never for grocery shopping or any other shopping for that matter. By then the comfort and trust will be a lot more on the online transactions. My generation too is getting on track and prepared with the online shopping. Infact some of my friends and collegues already are into it big time!.... and they are happy.

Will there be a need for the stores at all?  It'll be minimal, for that matter malls may have kiosks of the different brands where the shopper makes a virtual cart and selects items from the list makes payments and signs off from the kiosk. When he is home the order is delivered at his doorstep. Stores won't require to maintain large shops instead have little kiosks with a person to guide the shopper with the purchases. The shopper need not even bother with carrying the stuff back home with him. It'll all be delivered at his doorstep. The situation will be win win as the stores need not have such a huge workforce. There won't be the need to store and stack the merchandise in the premier showroom. Most of it can be in the go downs and warehouses elsewhere. Our children, the young professionals then can enjoy playing their temple runs and angry birds or even the falmville. When farming can be done online shopping is certainly a cakewalk! They'll love their online shopping.

Companies can save on their brand ambassadors, shop spaces, work force and so on. But they might have to use some freebies in the form of  new online games that the shoppers will be game for.

So won't see the vegetables, fruits or any other thing physically but will have the pictures of them taken on a real good camera with high pixels. Easier for everyone to select from the list and put in their carts, payments would be through credit cards. Imagine not going to a messy bhaaji market or the smelly fish market and haggling the rates with the Moushis...

Shopping, and how?....ofcourse online!

This post has been written for The future of shopping on indiblogger in association with eBay.

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The pictures have been taken from Google from different websites with due credit to each one of them.