the.com/retail
theater where strangers rehearse wanting things, then pay full price for the privilege
means The selling of goods directly to individual customers in small quantities, as opposed to wholesale.
from From Old French 'retaillier,' meaning to cut off or clip a piece, built from 're-' plus 'tailler,' to cut (the same root that gives us 'tailor' and 'detail'). The idea was selling in small pieces snipped from a larger whole — buying a bolt of cloth wholesale, then 'retailing' it yard by yard. The word's been doing this work in English since the 14th century, and that cutting sense survives oddly in the phrase 'to retail a story' — to pass it along in pieces.
- origin
- From French retailler, meaning to cut into pieces
- cold math
- Stores chill aisles so you shop faster
- endcap power
- Aisle-end displays can triple a product's sales
- music tempo
- Slow songs make shoppers linger and spend more
- loss leaders
- Cheap milk lures you past everything pricier
amazon — world's largest e-commerce retailer by revenue, $575.8b in 2023
walmart — largest physical retail chain globally, 10,500+ stores across 24 countries
alibaba — china's dominant e-commerce platform, $65b gmv in 2023
costco — largest membership-based warehouse retailer, $252b revenue in 2023