While retail has faced its fair share of challenges over the last two years, the pandemic has also provided an opportunity for a long-overdue great retail reset, which could help many retailers move into a more stable—and profitable—position. To get there, you must balance short-term challenges with long-term commitments and transformational thinking.
For nearly two years, predictions about the future of retail have appeared pessimistic, and retail headlines for 2022 don't look much better: empty store shelves, over one million unfilled retail jobs1, and surging inflation. However, these headwinds have resulted in some positive outcomes: retailers have been forced to re-examine legacy systems and strategies that have shaped the industry for years.
To reap long-term and long-lasting benefits, retailers should continue down the remediation path they started at the start of the pandemic in 2022. Indeed, the next 12 months’ present opportunities to restructure obsolete supply chains, rightsize inventory management, review pricing, rebalance promotional cadences, and reinvent the physical store for the digital age. This will almost certainly necessitate entirely new ways of thinking and long-term commitments from retailers, but these efforts have the potential to forever change the way retailers do business. That future begins today by addressing short-term retail challenges with a long-term perspective.
Three retail industry priorities and trends
The resulting data, when combined with insights from 15 Deloitte retail subject-matter specialists, client work, and prior research, provides a snapshot of strategies and investment plans that help inform the industry's future.
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Reimagine the workforce
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Supply chain resiliency
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Digital revolution
Retailers face significant challenges that will almost certainly outlast the pandemic, but there are also unexpected opportunities that can help them prepare for future disruptions. Retailers should embrace the current disruption and commit to a future pivot. To learn more, download our complete 2022 retail industry outlook.