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LETTER TO THE EDITOR

Electronic ShoppingHaving just finished your editorial ["Future Retailing" in the March 9 issue], I was somewhat perplexed that you are not addressing the future in terms of electronic shopping. The vast majority of shoppers today will continue to make the trip to the local grocery store each week, or perhaps several times a week. However, in the future, there will be remote shopping via electronic

Electronic Shopping

Having just finished your editorial ["Future Retailing" in the March 9 issue], I was somewhat perplexed that you are not addressing the future in terms of electronic shopping. The vast majority of shoppers today will continue to make the trip to the local grocery store each week, or perhaps several times a week. However, in the future, there will be remote shopping via electronic services. The value-adders this type of service can offer to the average shopper are aggressive, to say the least. A recent article in USA Today predicted that by the year 2000, in California alone, two out of three requests for service for telephone lines will be for computer hookups. What that implies is that consumers will no longer be making the trip to the grocery store. I have been using a shopping service for over a year now and would find it hard to go back to shopping the "old-fashioned way." Most retailers that I talk to today acknowledge that a shopping revolution is coming, but few are thinking about how to address the issue, or will debate its worth in the business as we know it today.