2024 has been yet another in a string of wilder-than-wished-for years in retail. While help wanted signs still hang in most shop windows, our retail respondents continue to tell us they simply cannot find and retain the type of talent customers demand. At the same time, shoppers continue to tell us of a growing apathy towards retailers’ challenges. In the shoppers’ eyes, either a retailer can solve their problem – or they can’t – end of story. No quarter is given for why an item is out of stock, why an employee is nowhere to be found, or why an interaction with a found associate is less than helpful. 

As a result, retailers are being forced to re-evaluate the role of many long-held beliefs.

Are stores still destinations for shoppers? If so, what is the true role of the in-store workforce for those shoppers? And if that role includes being a knowledgeable face to the brand, how on earth are retailers expected to make those employees more valuable than they currently are?

As is to be expected, RSR conducted a series of studies in 2024 to help answer some of these questions. The Cliff’s notes from a year’s worth of in-depth research:

• Shoppers still see stores as a destination worth visiting. For now.
• Retailers are somewhat divided about what the role of the modern store associate should be.
  • Product segment has a greater impact on that variance than any other factor (retailer size, geography – even sales performance).
• Every version of that role, however, requires more technologies than are currently in widespread use to be fully actualized.

To help add some color to the current landscape, consider the following data, taken from a recent custom research report that we conducted for a private client on the state of SMB retailing (the client – Epicor – has agreed to allow us to share this data, but the majority of the findings from that report remain private to them).

Figure 1: Are Employees Just There To Stock Shelves? Far From It

Source: RSR Research, September 2024

As Figure 1 shows, the concept that in-store associates can just be any warm body to keep merchandise on the floor and checkout lines humming along is a complete farce. In fact, in the eyes of our retail respondents, store associates are not there to simply execute pricing and promotion tasks, either – they are there to be experts about the products being sold. They are there to assist with selling where it happens and in the moment of decision. They are there to know more about comparable products than a customer can, even when that customer has their smartphone in hand. And by a large margin, at that.

In short, retailers want employees to be easier and more valuable for a customer to engage with than to turn to their own mobile device, and this is a tall order compared to what most shoppers experience today.

This is good news, because consider what shoppers previously told us in a separate study:

Figure 2: Shoppers Want More, As Well

Source: RSR Research, December 2023

For the time being, the majority of shoppers will still actively seek out an in-store associate when they have an issue in store. However, the margin of percentage is not much lower for each of the ensuing options we put forth before our pool of 1,000 US-based shoppers (aged 18+). Empathy for why a valuable associate is waning, and it is only a short hop from the empathic consumer to the one who says, “I do not care that it is hard for retailers to find quality employees these days – it is their responsibility.”

What then, are retailers to do?

The Mobile Component

We asked our same pool of retail respondents what would happen if they enabled their associates with more mobile technologies. The number one reason they’d want a more connected retail worker? To improve assisted selling (Figure 3).

Figure 3: A More Connected Retail Worker = Improved Selling Capabilities

Source: RSR Research, September 2024

Offering more mobile enablement to retail store associates can help SMB retailers improve a great multitude of functions in stores today, ranging from attracting better employees (more on that in a moment) to achieving higher customer satisfaction stores. However, these outcomes – and that of virtually all of the outcomes in the data above – are predicated on a single notion: mobile technology enables the modern-day store associate to do more (and be far more helpful) than they currently are.

To further highlight these advantages, note how retailers react to the following list of provocative statements about their current store environments (Figure 4).

Figure 4: Mobile Tech Has Many Advantages

Source: RSR Research, September 2024

Our respondents are clear, and the virtuous cycle is as follows: attract better talent and provide smart mobile technologies with which they are already familiar, help shoppers by making sure desired products are always in-stock and that they can check out quickly. By doing so, the gains are hopefully enough to not only retain existing customers, but help draw in new shoppers, as well. The fact that SMB retailers have a better chance to leverage such tools to their advantage – and to differentiate themselves from larger and more staid retailers? Icing on the cake.

This is unique moment for retailers. The very best will seize it.