Bose is closing all of its retail stores

Bose, the American audio equipment giant, has announced the closure of all 119 stores in the United States, Europe, Japan and Australia. The company's activities and resources will now be aimed at e-commerce. Most of the current sales, in fact, are online today, mainly through platforms such as Amazon, Best Buy, Target. According to ecommerceDb data for 2018, Bose made US 164.9 million dollars from online sales alone, out of a total revenue of 4 billion dollars. Instead, stores in mainland Asia will remain open. Recalling the opening of the first store, Vice President of Global Sales Colette Burke said:

"Originally, our retail stores gave people a way to experience, test, and talk to us about multi-component, CD and DVD-based home entertainment systems. At the time, it was a radical idea, but we focused on what our customers needed, and where they needed it — and we’re doing the same thing now."

Since the 1990s, when Bose was born, the public's shopping habits have changed a lot. According to various researches, the retail crisis is due to the birth of a "hybrid consumer", who arrives in the store knowing what he is looking for after searching online for products, features, prices and reviews. Diego Persali and Enrico Verga, respectively in a conference organized by Wired and on the pages of Il Sole 24 Ore, have indicated as a solution the phygital which is a combination between physical and digital reality to give life to new experiences more and more customized and interactive. In the words of Diego Parsali:

"[The retail store] is not dead, but it will remain the favorite shopping experience thanks to its specific features of immediacy and interpersonal relationships. At the same time it must be equipped with voice systems, augmented reality tools, tools designed for consumers, social tools and last but not least the so-called purpose, i.e. the ability to transmit values beyond the individual goods and products, in which the most advanced consumer can identify. It is, therefore, necessary to focus on multi-channeling and the ability to combine a multiplicity of factors including sustainability, personalization, delivery services and, for the youngest, contactless digital payment systems".

The strategy of complete conversion to e-commerce is a strategy that, not only Bose, but many other companies have adopted, such as Opening Ceremony that, within hours of the acquisition by New Guards Group, announced the closure of its retail spaces by the end of 2020.