Thanks for the kind words!
You’re right, I didn’t touch on all the shifts that are happening in retail, specifically around the malls, online commerce, and the concept of death in the middle - where today as a brick-n-mortar retailer you’re options are really only providing a one-of-kind experience (such as Apple) or sell merchandise at very low cost (such as Marshall’s).
Also, I think it’s more wholesalers that are feeling the impact of brands going consumer direct. However, the shift in cutting out the middleman is a shift that’s already been happening across several industries. Think Dell in their prime.
You brought up a very good point with Amazon. Amazon is basically a blackbox with merchants, meaning that they pass along very little information/demographics on who are buying your products. So when talking to clients, the conversation focuses on how can we work with partners that act as a middle layer to capture 1st party audience data (to begin to segment and use for targeting & retargeting) even if the sale and fulfillment is done by Amazon or other big box retailers.
Love the feedback and sorry this was a bit delayed.
No worries! Appreciate the reply. Amazing to me that, more than 20 years after the web's mainstream deployment, people still buy as much as they do offline at all.