ViPlus.BlogSpot.Com: Shoppers

Shopping online is quick and easy – surfing through Amazon in your underwear means no long lines to deal with or wandering through aisles of stuff to find the one thing you want. When shoppers do find themselves in a physical location, more often than not they check out a product in person and then use bar code scanning apps to find the best deal for their item online without having to make an in-store purchase. What’s a big box retailer to do?

The New York Times‘s Stephanie Clifford reports that big retailers like Walmart, Macy’s and Best Buy are adapting by turning their stores into extensions of their online businesses. In April, Walmart began letting shoppers pay for online products in cash at their stores to appeal to customers without bank accounts or credit cards. Walmart chief executive tells Clifford that more than half of the company’s online sales are now picked up at Walmart stores.

SEE ALSO: How Augmented Reality Is Shaping the Future of Retail

Some retailers are going even further. The Container Store offers a drive-through service for online purchases and aims to end transactions as soon as possible so customers don’t take their money elsewhere. Nordstrom and Macy’s have combined their physical and online inventories. If for example nordstrom.com is sold out of a product, customers can have their item shipped to them from a retail store. By the end of 2012, Macy’s will have almost 300 stores that can ship items to online customers.

Would these new shopping options make you more likely to step inside an honest-to-goodness physical retail store? Tell us what you think in the comments.

[Via The New York Times]

Image courtesy of iStockphoto, leaf

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Stretching the family budget has never seemed more challenging, that is, if you’re trying to allocate what’s coming in to accommodate everything going out.

Factor in costs for lodging, utilities, food, clothing, educational expenses and some other necessities, and there’s not much wiggle-room when it comes to the family car purchase.

Make that, the purchase of a new family car.

Two recent surveys shed a little light on just what some Americans told the surveying entities about how they’re feeling the pinch (or not) of escalating gas prices. Our colleagues at GreenCarReports cite an Auto Pacific survey that found car shoppers not too bothered by the current high gas prices. Indeed, 42 percent said they wouldn’t change the type of vehicle they drive, even if gas hit $10 a gallon.

Gas prices in California [photo: Charlene Birkeland]

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However, as Richard Read points out in TheCarConnection, another of our sister publications, the recent survey by Kelley Blue Book (KBB) paints an entirely different picture. Sixty-six percent told KBB that they “have either changed their minds about which vehicle they are considering, or are thinking about vehicles they normally would not have considered, due to rising gas prices.”

And, as we reported in January, J.D. Power and Associates’ 2012 Avoider Study found that gas mileage is the number one driver for vehicle purchases today.

Here’s what we know. With the average car price at $30,000, forking out $4.43 and up per gallon (in California and other parts of the U.S.) and looking at even higher fuel prices come summer, means we’ll probably have to get very creative at parsing out household dollars, combine more errands, drive less, and, if we’re in the market for a new vehicle, choose one that’s as fuel-efficient as possible and still meets our needs.

Yes, some of us may plunk down money and buy a 2012 Toyota Prius v, or a 2013 Chevrolet Malibu Eco, or a 2013 Ford Focus Electric, or any of a growing selection of hybrid, mild hybrid, or pure electric vehicles. Then, again, gasoline-powered family cars are becoming more and more fuel efficient. There are plenty of choices available to suit family needs.

What do you think? Is the pain at the pump really putting a crimp in your family budget? Specifically, are higher gas prices going to impact what you buy when it comes time to replace your current car, wagon, crossover, SUV or minivan? Share your thoughts in the comments section below.

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