The emporium strikes back

“THE staff at Jessops would like to thank you for shopping with Amazon.” With that parting shot plastered to the front door of one of its shops, a company that had been selling cameras in Britain for 78 years shut down in January. The bitter note sums up the mood of many who work on high streets and in shopping centres (malls) across Europe and America. As sales migrate to Amazon and other online vendors, shop after shop is closing down, chain after chain is cutting back. Borders, a chain of American bookshops, is gone. So is Comet, a British white-goods and electronics retailer. Virgin Megastores have vanished from France, Tower Records from America. In just two weeks in June and July, five retail chains with a total turnover of £600m ($900m) failed in Britain.

Watching the destruction, it is tempting to conclude that shops are to shopping what typewriters are to writing: an old technology doomed by a better successor. Seattle-based Amazon, nearing its 19th birthday, has lower costs than the vast majority of bricks-and-mortar retailers. However many shops, of whatever remarkable hypersize, a company builds in the attempt to offer vast choice at low prices, the internet is vaster and cheaper. Prosperous Londoners and New Yorkers ask themselves when was the last time they went shopping; their shopping comes to them. “Retail guys are going to go out of business and e-commerce will become the place everyone buys,” pronounces Marc Andreessen, a celebrity venture capitalist. “You are not going to have a choice.”