Whither Wearables, and What Else Lies Ahead in 2017

by

The following is an excerpt from the latest installment of TWICE’s Executive Retail Roundtable, in which we gather some of the best and the brightest in tech retail to address the state of the industry. Join us for a deep dive into the challenges facing the retail business today:

TWICE: What technologies do you find exciting? What would you like to see on the CES show floor that maybe isn’t there yet?
Steve Baker, VP, industry analyst, The NPD Group: There’s something that isn’t on the show floor?

Dave Workman, president/CEO, ProSource: I’m going to the Amazon booth because I want to personally meet Alexa.

Laura Orvidas, CE VP, Amazon: She’s great.

Neal Martinelli, merchandising VP, HSN: I want to see smart home. It’s a big focus for us. It was a huge category for us last year. Alexa is that magic thing that gets people to wake up to the possibilities. The water is warm and I can turn it up to a boil, but I need the products and I need them to work right and I need the simplicity.

Read the full article on TWICE.com

Through the Looking Glass with AR/VR

by

The following is an excerpt from the latest installment of TWICE’s Executive Retail Roundtable, in which we gather some of the best and the brightest in tech retail to address the state of the industry. Join us for a deep dive into the challenges facing the retail business today:

TWICE: What lies ahead for VR and AR, from both a product and a retail experience standpoint?
Neal Martinelli, merchandising VP, HSN: We’re looking at that right now, VR and AR, not only from a consumer perspective but just for entertainment. It’s going to be everywhere; it’s going to be very pervasive. I think you’re going to see a lot of advancement very rapidly over the next year or two on both fronts.

Read the full article on TWICE.com

Just How Good Were Holiday Sales At Retail?

by

The latest installment of TWICE’s Executive Retail Roundtable, in which we gather some of the best and the brightest in tech retail to address the state of the industry, revealed an optimism about 2017 and the prospects for such categories as Ultra HD TV, connected home and virtual and augmented reality systems. Join our deep dive into the challenges facing the retail business today:

TWICE: Let’s start with the holidays, and you in particular Laura, because Amazon described it as the best holiday season in the company’s history. How much of that can you take credit for?
Laura Orvidas, CE VP, Amazon: All of it — my own holiday shopping contributed. [Laughter.]

We had a great holiday season. A lot of our success was buoyed by Echo and the other Amazon devices. We saw a lot of customers come and interact on a variety of our products.

TWICE: “Millions sold” was Amazon’s official statement, but do you have any hard numbers on the Alexa devices?
Orvidas: Nine times our previous holiday season.

Mobile shopping was also very hot. Over 72 percent of Amazon customers worldwide shopped using their mobile devices, and on Cyber Monday alone customers purchased 46 electronic items per second on a mobile device.

Read the full article on TWICE.com

How Alexa And Home Networking Are Stirring Up The Smart Home (And Other Holiday Insights From Top Retail Execs)

by

It’s kinda startling how much ground can be covered in less than 90 minutes when you lock eight leading industry merchants (and one renowned CE analyst) inside a room and discourage the use of mobile phones.

[Read more…]

Get in the Game: An eSports Primer for CE Retailers

by

By Rob Stott

Quick! What comes to mind when you hear the word eSports?

If you’re like most of the “outsiders,” you likely paint a picture of someone sitting in bed (or his parents’ basement) munching on a bag of Doritos with a funny looking headset on, lights off, sitting inches away from his computer monitor.

That image would not be entirely false, but it’s a gross underrepresentation of an industry that is booming, has broad appeal, and could come to define the future of consumer electronics retailing.

Let’s forget about the retail side of things for a second, though, and focus only on the market itself. Who (or what?) is an eSports athlete? How much money is floating around in sponsorship dollars, prize pools, and more? Is the eSports industry really big enough for you, the retailer, to care about?

A good place to start is getting a solid understanding around what eSports actually is.

“Esports (electronic sports) is professional computer gaming,” the World eSports Association (WESA) said in an interview with Dealerscope. “Athletes from around the world participate in online and offline tournaments against each other. The games are broadcast and streamed in numerous languages, allowing fans all over the globe to follow the action live on a regular basis.”

Click here to read the full article on dealerscope.com

New Age: ‘Show Me’ Millennials, Female Buyers Will Still Rule in 2017

by

By New Age Electronics President Fred Towns’ account, 2017, for the foreseeable future, is going to be about meeting growing “show me” expectations of both Millennials and female buyers – two demographics that are “more powerful than ever,” and that helped holiday sales to move forward and spike, after a slightly “slowed down” start fueled by concerns in the run-up to the 2016 election.

 

Read the full article on Dealerscope.com

New Age Electronics Names BJ’s, Purchasing Power Retailers Of The Year

by

New Age Electronics Names BJ’s, Purchasing Power Retailers Of The Year

National tech distributor New Age Electronics bestowed its annual Retailer of the Year award to BJ’s Wholesale Club in the brick-and-mortar category and Purchasing Power in the e-commerce channel.

Read the full article on TWICE.com

New Age Takes the Omni-Market Experience Up a Notch

by

The 2016 New Age Electronics Retail Dealer Summit kicked off July 20 at Hollywood, Calif.’s Loews Hollywood Hotel with promises from the distributor’s top New Age and SYNNEX executives that the roughly 100 retailers represented here would leave the meeting armed with the tools to enhance what Fred Towns, New Age Electronics’ president, termed as the “omni-market” experience, across the board, for several of their key customer demographics.

[Read more…]