If society wants to limit the death of the High Street, then it only needs to introduce regulations which limit the amount of sales of physical goods which can be done remotely. If companies such as Amazon have to sell as many goods physically as they do remotely, then the large ‘fulfilment centres’ that currently dot the landscape at the expense of small high street stores would be greatly reduced. Sales could be limited by revenue, which would ensure not only that physical stores existed, but also that they were spread across the towns, cities and countries in question. The result would be a reintroduction of shops to the high street and shopping centres and a reduction in the competitiveness of companies with an internet only presence compared to those with a physical only presence.
High Streets and indeed physical shops are seeing massive hardship from the increase in internet shipping – a situation made worse by the current pandemic. Yet there is a simple solution… introduce regulations which state that companies cannot conduct more than 50% (revenue) of the sale of physical goods online. Done.
Amazon et al could just route excess online sales through a ‘local’ fulfillment centre in various High streets… Like an ‘Argos’ outlet maybe? But how would this help the High Street? Consumers demand meaningful retail choice but how much choice is reasonable is a moot point.
Maybe the Aldi/Lidl model is a good mix of stocking the maximum High Street product range in store but within a minimal product brand range? Are these multiple brand choices in the larger supermarkets really necessary? The discounters also do larger non food items online with the more portable non food items on sale in store.
I think consumers need to decide whether they want maximum online product ranges/prices or whether they want smaller offerings in local shops but they can’t have both. And if they want to buy from Amazon or Wayfair then the government should tax them to the hilt in a similar way to small retailers and ensure that all staff are on permanent contracts. But will they?