In a move that was, at least for me a complete surprise, Salesforce.com announced intentions to acquire commerce vendor DemandWare for $75/share or $2.85 billion. For those of you keeping score, that’s 7.3 time annual revenue. No matter how you slice it, that’s a lot of money.

Certainly, it signifies Salesforce’s entry into the digital commerce market, and in fact, CEO Marc Benioff declared that the company will be extending its leadership with the “Salesforce Commerce Cloud. ” He quoted an incremental total addressable market (TAM) for Salesforce of over $8 billion. Boy: that sounds like a stretch.

I’ll leave it to the stock analysts to analyze the numbers (one response can be found in Forbes here, and it’s not a pretty one). Our job is to always ask, “What does it mean for retailers? ” On first blush, I don’t see a whole lot to cheer or jeer about. Here’s why.

One thing came clear when I listened to the announcement: someone was going to be buying DemandWare and Salesforce was the eventual winner. According to DemandWare CEO Tom Ebling (former CEO of Profitlogic, who clearly has a knack for squeezing maximum value out of the companies he heads), the company received a lot of “inbound interest ” and chose Salesforce as the “best acquirer. ” Mr. Ebling called it the “most compelling transaction ” for DemandWare, which translates to me as “behind the scenes bidding war that Salesforce won. “

So was Salesforce the best option for retailers? There was a lot of emphasis placed on the call in saying that essentially for the foreseeable future, the new owner will be leaving the business somewhat alone. Continual mention was made of Salesforce’s purchase of Exact Target as a model for this acquisition. I see that as good news for retailers. Behind the scenes, a lot of integration work will be going on.

Apparently the companies already have a joint customer base. Time constraints prevented me from getting a list of these joint customers from DemandWare, so I can’t shed any light on names, but apparently those joint customers were saying they want the entire suite. If you are one of those customers, please drop me a line!

Mr. Ebling was asked what Salesforce could do for DemandWare that the company couldn’t do on its own. His answer: “This accelerates our mission to transform retail. ” The company has three strategic initiatives: going after larger accounts (Salesforce has relationships there), geographic expansion (they’ve just gotten started in Japan and Italy where Salesforce has a strong presence) and a move into unified commerce to help retailers engage with consumers everywhere. Their clients use Salesforce for clienteling and CRM and DemandWare saw this merger as a powerful way to accelerate that capability.

So, what does this mean for retailers? Partner Nikki Baird disagrees with me on this one, but I think the pricing models will have to get rationalized. Yes, you’re receiving a monthly bill, but one is based on usage and the other is based on seats. That’s a very different model of fixed vs. variable costs. I know which one I would lobby for as a retailer.

Also, it tells us that the whole notion of a single view of the customer is getting a lot of vendor attention. This is a very good thing for retailers. After the Manhattan Momentum event, I mentioned that the “company is making an opportunistic grab at a seemingly under-served area: Customer Data Management. ” Apparently Salesforce is attempting to serve it. Messaging will require some work, as retailers generally cringe at the term “CRM ” which is Salesforce’s sweet spot.

What else does it mean for retailers? I think there are still some shoes to drop. Other software vendors are looking for commerce engines. There aren’t many out there still independent. IHL’s Jerry Shelton mentions Magento as a likely target for someone. Adobe is the name most bandied about as a potential buyer, but I’m quite certain there are others.

Overall, I’m giving this deal a cautious “thumbs up. ” If Salesforce can add financial resources to DemandWare, to fuel its growth and stability, that will be a good thing. Every step the industry takes towards an integrated customer experience platform will be welcome by customers and retailers alike.

There’s a certain irony here. Less than one year after Salesforce’s first appearance at the NRF Big Show (and not even really among the front-and-center vendor displays), the company has bought its way into the middle of the industry. Who will be next?

And who ever thought retail would become the “hot ” place to be? That might well be the biggest irony of all.