Christopher Flaherty, Vietec
Christopher Flaherty, owner of Vietec Heating, speculates about the future of the traditional merchant counter in an age of online shopping.
In the last few weeks I have seen lots of mentions about merchants closing down branches – Plumb Center, Plumbase and Travis Perkins Group – are they a thing of the past?
I personally now mostly buy materials online. I can have them delivered direct to site, I can sit at my computer and go through and pick the items I need, choose delivery address and options for early delivery time (at a premium), I make payment, job done. I usually do this once at home.
Compare this to queuing in a merchant, not enough staff, even when you eventually get served its by someone who does not have a clue what you are asking for and has to go to someone else in the merchant to ask, and often after a long wait they do not have what you need. Many hours a week could be lost in a merchants. The downside to online suppliers is the public can buy the goods at the same price as we can, so we have lost the ability to make a profit on materials.
I think merchants starting going downhill a quite few years ago. Staff became very poor at their job and were poorly trained. What caused this decline? I think merchants were slow to adapt to a changing world. The likes of Screwfix took the right option, early opening, usually before any merchants – they are open until 8pm, much later than most merchants, and you can order online and you get a text when your items are ready. You can simply walk in and collect your goods and just have a PIN verification. Some Screwfix branches are now open 24hrs, something merchants seemed reluctant to do. I know some of the online merchants are owned by the big merchants.
But are we going to see the end of local walk-in branches – and the question is: do we think this is a good or a bad thing and would it bother you either way.
