Another service, YourSherpa, is for hurried adults who want to scan items and turn the Palm computer over to a mall employee who collects the goods and has them rung up, gift wrapped, delivered, or just displayed for a second viewing. A third service, Tenantconnect.net, is for mall tenants only and offers them broadband Internet connection for in-store online shopping and for managing inventories. Simon Properties intends to make the service available to malls other than its own. Even optimistic projects say the Internet will account for only 10 percent of total retail sales by 2006. We believe many shoppers will pre-shop on the Internet in advance and then come into the mall to pick up the items.
Many customers go to the mall partly to be entertained.
A strong argument for bricks and mortar is the appearance of off-site retailers. Mass. It has computer terminals on the sales floor for customers to order goods online. Inc. All rights reserved.