A larger opportunity lies in using the Web to increase in-store sales, he says. In Musk's vision of the future shopping experience, consumers will use local media portal sites to assist them in making shopping decisions. In due time, when enough retailers make their computerized inventories available for interface with the online shopping search engine, you'll see how much footballs cost at various local sporting goods stores. Of course, you could always go to a ball-selling Web retailer like JustBalls , where you can order a football online and have it delivered to your door in a day or two. So, the opportunity of the Web is in letting consumers research which of their local stores carry a particular item that they seek, and ideally comparison shop online to see which retailer offers the best deal.
Pricing is of course a major difference between cyber and physical retailers.
Many of the online stores offer prices that are deeply discounted over what you'd pay at a local store. Even accounting for shipping charges with online shopping, it's often still cheaper to buy online. But price is a powerful motivator for buying online instead of at the local mall. The local store of course can't afford to lower their prices to match the prices of online discount retailers, but it can grab back those customers who otherwise would opt for the cheaper price at the online store. As Musk explains it, if price is the determining factor, the local store is going to lose the customer.