In-store pickup does not save U.S. shoppers much time -study

Major U.S. retailers including Target Corp and Toys ‘R Us have begun allowing shoppers to collect online purchases at their brick-and-mortar stores, but a study shows the option often saves little, if any, time over in-store shopping.
According to a small study to be released on Tuesday by retail-intelligence firm StellaService, in-store pickup saved shoppers just 96 seconds on average compared with searching for items on their own. In a few cases, in-store pickup took longer.
In-store pickup is one of many services being tested as retailers try to use their stores as mini-shipping hubs to get items to shoppers more quickly. It comes in response to competition from the No. 1 U.S. online retailer, Amazon.com Inc , which has streamlined its delivery service.
The StellaService study, based on 44 visits to stores in the South run by 11 retailers, is one of the most comprehensive studies so far of the in-store pickup service. The results show that retailers have no uniform approach to the issue.  Reuters – Read more…​