The 'retail' sector will debate the resilience of the sector in the face of consumption changes

The Catalan association of family retail businesses Comertia has called the entire retail sector to a new debate day on the future. The meeting will serve to analyze and present some of the business experiences that have shown how resilience has positioned itself as the way to face challenges, as happened with the pandemic. Under the slogan The future belongs to the resilient, next Wednesday, November 10, Barcelona will be the meeting point for the sector, at the XIX edition of the Retail Conference.

The objective is to publicize the business experiences of brands that, despite capacity restrictions, lack of foot traffic in stores, temporary closures during 2020 and much of this year, have shown that they could continue doing business by rethinking sales channels and opening new ones, strengthening communication and social networks, and accelerating their digitalization processes, to continue satisfying demand and being close to their customers. It has been a demonstration of resilience by firms that, despite the situation, have managed to find expansion opportunities, new business lines, or launch new products or services to the market.

As a promoter of the debate, the employers' association Comertia —which groups 4,000 establishments from a hundred brands— wants to give visibility to this whole world of opportunities and transmit "a luminous and hopeful vision about the future of retail," according to David Sánchez, its president.

Sánchez states that the current situation of retail trade, although there is a certain business recovery, is still full of uncertainties "because many companies have high levels of indebtedness and because activity has not recovered one hundred percent and much less in all business categories equally; in fact, in no case have pre-pandemic levels been reached yet."

Furthermore, in the current situation, the main concerns of entrepreneurs are the possible impact on consumption due to the forced rise in product prices, the high cost of supplies, inflation, or the lack of products, mainly, according to the latest sales indicator from Comertia establishments.

In October, 60% of its companies saw sales increases and 40% saw decreases compared to the same month in 2020; and what is observed is a clear consumer preference in areas that involve enjoying life and living experiences. The sales forecast for November is to grow 22.7% compared to the same month in 2020.

The sector is concerned about the forced rise in article prices, the high cost of supplies, inflation, and product shortages.

Also sharing their experience will be Jordi Pons, manager of Antoni Pons, a footwear manufacturer that has focused on the internationalization of its products and e-commerce, and Lluís Soler, CEO of Quadis, the dealership network with more than 80 years of experience that recently opted for diversification by entering the bicycle segment with the purchase of Probike and Bicisport.

The Retail Conference will also address changes in consumption habits and the retail sector as a whole, with experts Miguel Zorraquino, director of the purchasing trend analysis consultancy Zorraquino, and Iñaki Lecue, business and research consultant at CaixaBank. As an example, for all Comertia companies, the weight of online sales represents an average of 5.4% of total turnover.

The event, which will take place at Cosmocaixa, will conclude with contributions from chef Nandu Jubany, who during the pandemic and post-pandemic has also made resilience the key point for maintaining activity in his gastronomic establishments.