ABSTRACT
For centuries, communities have gathered in retail centres, market places, town centres and shopping malls in order to find the goods and services they require. But advances in digital technologies, software development and global access to the Internet has revolutionised how many of us shop. The impact of this changing shopping behaviour is affecting the physical footprint of many types of retail centres, as many businesses adapt to the new trading environment and close their physical stores in favour of selling via digital channels. Where once the Internet was a little-known trading environment used mainly by tech-savvy 30-something, high income males living in the US, in less than 25 years the web has become a mainstream retail channel, which more than half of the world’s population can access. This chapter explores how this shopping revolution began, how online shopping has grown, which retailers are the winners and losers online and what this might mean for the future of towns and cities everywhere.
