A huge increase in online shopping over time pandemic it was a savior for retailers, but it has a price.
Buyers are expected to return twice as many items as during last year’s holiday, costing companies about $ 1.1 billion, according to Narvar Inc., a software and technology company that manages online returns for hundreds of dollars. marks.
Retailers don’t want returns, but they want shoppers who may not feel safe when they go to stores to feel comfortable buying things they haven’t seen or tried in person.
People have made so many online purchases since March that carriers like UPS and FedEx were already at full capacity before the holiday shopping season. And online sales continue to grow. From November 1 to Tuesday, online sales rose 32% to $ 171.6 billion from a year ago, according to Adobe Analytics.
Massive challenges in the delivery of COVID-19 vaccines in the coming weeks and months could put additional pressure on delivery system. This means that buyers who return items cannot receive refunds until two weeks after they are returned to the store, said Sara Skirboll, a shopping expert at the RetailMeNot bidding site.
“Great time to be in the business of returns”
Many companies offer more locations where customers can opt out of returns, which reduces shipping costs and gets refunds to buyers faster.
Last year, Kohl’s began allowing Amazon to return to all of its 1,000 stores – customers deliver items for free, without the need for a box or label. This year, Amazon customers can also return items to 500 Whole Foods Market stores. This is in addition to Amazon’s agreement with UPS to allow similar abandonment to UPS stores.
Walmart, the nation’s largest retailer, announced earlier this week that it will pick up items delivered and sold by Walmart.com from customers’ homes for free through a new partnership with FedEx. The service will continue beyond the holiday shopping season.
Happy Returns, a startup in Santa Monica, California, that works with about 150 online retailers such as Rothy’s and Revolve, has increased the number of drop-off locations to 2,600 from more than 700 last year. This includes 2,000 FedEx locations.
“It’s a great time to be in the field of returns. Every day, there is a record,” said David Sobie, CEO and co-founder of Happy Returns, noting that he processed 50% more returns in December than in November. .
But the ease of e-commerce creates a lot of environmental costs as well as the expensive cost of retailers. Last year, profits from online shopping created 5 billion tons of waste and produced both carbon dioxide and 3 million cars driving for a year, according to Optoro, a return logistics company.
Stores for shoppers: keep it
An increasing number of retailers are urging buyers not to even bother to return certain discarded items.
When Dick Pirozzolo wanted to return an oversized T-shirt he bought for $ 40 on a website called Online Cycling Gear, he was pleasantly surprised by the response. The site told him to keep it, throw it away or give it to a friend or charity – and sent him the right size for an extra $ 10.
“I was fine with that,” said the 77-year-old cycling enthusiast from Wellesley, Massachusetts. “I did a good thing for a friend and got a new shirt.” The experience, he says, gave him the confidence to buy more online this holiday season.
David Bassuk, global co-leader of retailer AlixPartners, says stores are making it easier for shoppers to feel less guilty about returning items.
“If you’re not sure about their size, order both sizes,” he said. “If you’re not sure which color, order both colors. And if you’re not sure which item, order them all. But it’s expensive for retailers, and retailers aren’t well positioned to bear all the costs.”
The practice of buying multiple sizes or styles of a single item – known in the industry as “bracketing” – increased by 50% during the pandemic, according to a Narvar report. “Consumers already used to use their bedrooms as rooms for online shopping, but the practice has increased this year,” Narvar said.
On average, people return 25% of the items they buy online, compared to only 8% of what they buy in stores, according to Forrester Research online analyst Sucharita Mulpuru. For clothing it is even higher, about 30%.
But not all rejected items are the same and have different levels of cushioning, experts say. After an item is sent back to the retailer, the company must assess its condition and decide whether to resell it, send it to a liquidator or landfill.
Optoro estimates that the value of fashionable clothing depreciates by 20% to 50% over a period of eight to 16 weeks. That is why it is so important to quickly return the rejected items and return them for sale.
The impact of early Black Friday
Returns are also complicated this year as retailers have pushed people to buy holiday gifts earlier to avoid shipping delays and crowded stores, which means the return window can be closed until it runs. Christmas.
Amazon allows customers to return items by January 31 for items delivered between October 1 and December 31, giving customers more time to decide. Last year, the policy did not include articles delivered in October.
Rachel Sakelaris, 25, of Newport Beach, California, bought her boyfriend a waterproof backpack on Black Friday, then realized there was a 30-day return policy. She decided to move the gift exchange last weekend, so she had time to return if she didn’t like it.
Buying too early can come with other dangers.
Sarah Huffman, 40, of Chesapeake, Virginia, wanted to start the holiday season and spent $ 600 on Amazon for gifts, including a pair of $ 60 pajamas and a $ 90 Xbox game for those five of her children in May.
But then her husband, a veteran with disabilities, quit his job because he felt his boss was too lax with COVD-19 safety protocols. Now, her family is struggling to put food on the table and cannot return some of the gifts she bought because the return window has expired.
“I tried to eliminate the stress of the pandemic by buying early,” she said. “I did not realize that the basic choices of life will find a new decline.”