Online retailing definitely affects traditional retailing. The issue of location still matters as traditional ( brick and mortar) formats offer real shopping experience( the touch and feel) to customers. The question is are shoppers willing to go online for all kinds of products? In the Indian context internet penetration is only 12%-15%, so location does matter. In the event of online retailing completely dominating offline retailing the location of warehouses rather than retail stores still matter.

No, location is important. Without accessibility, how are your customers going to reach you? Globalisation affects the products that are being exchanged but not the place of sale!

Prof. Paliwoda I am partially agreed about your answer. Few factors such as close proximity to the targeted consumer is not that much important in this modern era because if accessibility is there and consumer is prepare to pay the bills of online shopping and delivery charges then company will delivered goods and services where you need it. It doesn't matter in which market your shop is.

Hi Prashant,

I too say that the location of store is important in any physical market place. Even in the Online Shopping concept the location of store matters. However in this case warehouse is the store. If you take example of multiple online shopping sites such as Flipkart, Amazon then you can find that their own or their vendors major stores or warehouses are located at Tier 1 City Outskirts. That is because of the location rents and also the quickness of reachability to customers. You can find in Flipkart the option of with in a delivery in only few cities because of the warehouses in near by those locations which will help or contribute to raise in customer sales. Even if we consider the online shops the vendors has a choice of setting up their online shops in various sites or portals. say like a clothes shop vendor has a choice of opening his store in Flipkart (before mynthra deal) or Jabong. The choice about where to open his store makes affects his sales. In this case the site is the location (virtually).

I agree that location is important even in globalized environment. While online trade grows, it cannot account for many items, like bulky products (like constructions materials) and personal services (restaurants, theaters, hospitals). Also, still many people get information not on internet but just by physical glance. That is why the places where people concentrate (railways stations, main streets) generate higher demand and many firms would like to locate there.