Online returns are the new scourge of the UK’s retail industry. Growing by 95% between 2014 and 2019 alone, the threat to sustainability is enough to warrant discussion at the next COP summit.

Today, technology has drastically redefined how brands deliver customer experience.

Amongst the promised benefits of bleeding edge technologies and loud musings that the customer has changed forever, is there an alternative narrative that chimes better with the notion that retail, at its heart, is a cyclical industry?

There can be no doubt the pandemic has altered the emotional make-up of society. Collectively, we are now much more aware of the suffering of others – and how could we not be after seeing lives turned upside down and businesses upended with no sense of rhyme or reason or equity.

As we’ve mentioned in a previous article, 2021 saw smaller UK energy suppliers cease trading and exit the market at an unprecedented rate.

So far we have seen how customer demands are driving invention and innovation within the utilities industry.

Retail technology is perhaps one of the fastest growing industries coming out of the pandemic, with digitisation being one of the key aspects of this transformation.

You have a problem. Someone else has been talking to your customer. The likes of Amazon, Apple, Nordstorm – and the other gods of customer service have been educating your customer in what excellent looks and feels like.

Customer loyalty is the holy grail of brand. Less than a decade ago, consumers told marketing research company IPSOS MORI that they trusted certain household brands (Heinz, John Lewis, Walmart) more than the Government.

A popular online brokerage prided itself on building a customer experience that made trading stocks as easy as swiping right or left to purchase a book online.