Remember when online shopping was a speculative, questionable, and risky proposition? We used to wonder if anyone would ever do it. We feared the possibilities. And if you can believe it, we said it would never work.
We were all wrong. And frankly, we have no excuse for such shortsightedness. Everything we knew about shopping up to the internet was pushing us toward something like the internet. It was the inevitable conclusion to where shopping was always heading.
To understand this, you only need consider what shopping is and how it evolved. Shopping is one of the most vital functions of all living beings when viewed in a certain light. For the purposes of this write-up, shopping is the search for and acquisition of necessary goods and services for maintaining life. All creatures do it. They just don’t all have mega malls.
The Internet and First-Priority Needs
It starts with the securement of first-priority needs. Unfortunately, not every village has an abundance of those needs, making life a rather more challenging project in such places. The first duty of every community is to make first-priority needs easier to obtain. That is the first sign that the online shopping was inevitable.
Fundamentally, the internet is a way of connecting people who have with people who need. That mostly ends up being information. Someone has information that another person is interested in acquiring. But as online auction sites have shown, it is just as true for hard goods.
You don’t have to be in a developing nation to have trouble acquiring some first-priority goods such as prescription glasses. Not every town has labs that can produce any prescription on the spot. And frame selection can be extremely limiting depending on where you are. So for those who need eyewear, particularly cheap prescription glasses, online shopping may be their only practical option.
The Occasional Necessity of Shopping from Home
For a long time, there have been ways of doing your shopping from home. The Sears catalog is one of the oldest examples, and it was not alone. There were many catalogs that allowed people to order goods from big stores even regardless of how far they were from a retail space. Shopping channels on TV quickly filled that vacuum.
There are many good reasons why people need to shop from home. Some people may have emotional distress when shopping for sensitive, personal items in public. Some are disabled and can’t get out as freely as they would like.
Maybe you had to ground your teen for a month. They still need clothes. And there are online clothing options just for teens that can fill the bill.
The problem with other options for shopping from home is that you could never get the full experience or catalog. There were always items that couldn’t be properly displayed. Shipping was not as advanced as it is today. So logistics were also a challenge for certain types of items.
There was also no way for the smaller stores to compete in the home shopping space. So you were limited to certain stores.
The internet democratized home shopping so that even the smallest store can host a complete shopping experience. With various turn-key solutions, a person can open a business selling goods over the internet even if they don’t have a store, a warehouse, or any products they manufacture themselves. There are almost no limits to what you can buy online, unlike in your local market.
Convenience
There is more to convenience than location. Being able to pay in a convenient form is very near the top of the list. Businesses that require cash-only are driving customers online where paying for items is almost always more convenient.
There is also the convenience of delivery. If you use public transportation, getting many items, or just large items home can be challenging. When shopping online, you can often find the same items for less money, and that is after factoring in the shipping fees.
Online shopping was inevitable because it is the surest way to find and acquire first-priority needs. It best deals with the occasional necessity of shopping from home. And it is convenient in all the ways that matter, not just location.
I do not like shopping in store at all so having 5 kids, we go online often. They all know, dad doesn’t like the stores but if I have to, I will.
I’m doing a little more on-line shopping, but I really dislike it compared to going to a store. I don’t like returning things, and if I actually see something, I can tell better if I want it. There may be less choice, so then if you really can’t find it in the store, then I”d look online.
i dont shop on line that much ,but i do check prices before i go tothe store to see,if there is that much of a difference,sometimes it pays to compare
Excellent article. I like to shop online because I hate going to stores and at times my RA flares up and I can’t go out.
This is a great post. I prefer to shop online personally for just about everything except groceries.
Thank you for the information.
Yep, I remember when I thought people were nuts to shop online. I thought they would definitely be ripped off. I guess back then they sometimes were, but now most stores are really building their online shopping.