Renew the retail industry, objective of MAPIC 2018
Against a backdrop of problems of overcapacity, obsolete shopping malls and major retail brands redefining their business, MAPIC 2018 once again hosts leading actors in order to identify the best retail mix and stimulate growth and new business models under the slogan: Transforming Reality: Physical retailing in the Digital Age.
Organized by Reed MIDEM, the International Fair is to be held in Cannes from November 14 to 16, thereby exceeding the more than 8600 participants at the previous fair, including 2100 retailers.
In a rapidly-changing context, the role of the brick and mortar store is evolving. Electronic commerce is now a part of the retail sales channel in the same way that the brick and mortar store is: the two are complementary and feed off one another, provided that they are designed with the rationale of placing the client experience at the center of everything.
Nathalie Depetro, director of MAPIC: “Merchants and retailers have had to constantly innovate to survive the obstacles presented by industrial, sociological and technological advances”
The program includes global benchmark conferences of more than 100 speakers and on-line and off-line rallying points, the appearance of new demands, innovation as a key factor for adopting retail transformation and the importance of improving the client experience, among other matters to be addressed.
The Spanish Association of Shopping Malls (AECC) have a stand at the fair, which it will share with three co-exhibitors, the L35 Architecture Studio, Ghesa and Manubens, and it participate in the cycle of conferences in order to speak about the sector in our country though the Spanish Seminar.
Among the 2100 representatives of brands present in Cannes, MAPIC participants have the opportunity to get to know Bottega Portici (Italy), Bouchara (France), El Ganso, Desigual or Belros (Spain), Fresh (France) and Zapa (France) which are attending for the first time in addition to Zara, Uniqlo, C&A, Burger King, Hema, Benetton, Claire’s, Burberry, Adidas and Levi’s, who are regular participants at MAPIC.
In fact, the current world sales forecasts of eMarketer demonstrate that electronic commerce sales represent one tenth of retail sales in the entire world. That is, with notable discrepancies by territory, from 17% in the United Kingdom to 3.2% in Italy. This year, Asia-Pacific will be home to more than half of the digital purchasers in the world.
Approximately 61.7% of Internet users in Asia Pacific and 28.5% of its population will make a digital purchase this year. In comparison, approximately one quarter of digital purchasers in the entire world live in North America and Western Europe.
Nathalie Depetro, director of MAPIC, notes “from the beginning of commerce, merchants and retailers have had to stay in constant innovation in order to survive the obstacles presented by industrial, sociological and technological advances. We have to use this fact as an engine to create a new future retail combination. MAPIC is the rallying point for collecting information and expert advice as well as for choosing those new key partners that may speed up innovation both for retailers as well as developers”.
Online Giants
And for the first time, the heavy-weights of e-commerce, such as Amazon, Vente-Privée Entertainment, Made.com and Zalando will be speaking at MAPIC, thereby showing the existing intersection between physical and digital commerce. The intersection of digital and physical commerce is more and more in the news headlines. Walmart recently acquired Flipkart.
Alibaba is now investing in shopping malls in the USA. Whole Foods has been acquired by Amazon, which is opening more and more points of sale. And while the traditional brands have now adopted a digital strategy (for example, the acquisition of La Redoute by the Galeries Lafayette Group and Sarenza by Monoprix) more and more e-tailers, such as MADE.com, Missguided, Mi Stores and Warby Parker, are jumping into physical commerce.
The impact of digital and the explosion of online sales are encouraging retailers and commercial property professionals to completely rethink their physical points of sale to offer new and enhanced customer experiences. Leisure, food & beverage, well-being and innovation have become pillars of the offer in all commercial space, which are tending to become lifeplace destinations.
In a recent article for the New York Times, Joel Bines and David Bassuk of Alix Partners LPP commented, “Don’t bet against retail; the destruction it is going through is, as in the past, of the creative variety.” In the same article, they also drew attention to the “disrupter du jour: Amazon – which collected more than 40 cents of every dollar spent online last year. Few retailers have figured out yet how to compete effectively with Amazon, but some perspective is necessary.
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