A weekly podcast with the latest e-commerce news and events. Episode 159 is our annual predictions episode for 2019 and a recap of our 2018 predictions.
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2018 Recap – Predictions made on episode 112
Scot
- Mallageddon 2.0 – We saw 7000 stores close in 2017, I think this accelerates in 2018 as the 30-40% of weak malls fail closures. YES
- Amazon will NOT buy another offline retailer, triples down on private label. YES
- Amazon will squarely get in the last mile business in 2018 and compete with FedEx and UPS. NO
- Amazon’s ad group will get so large that they have to break out details about it and everyone will be shocked at how large it has gotten so quickly YES
- Walmart will make a big M+A – top candidates would be Instacart, postmates and eBay. YES
- Somebody acquires Magento, or they go public. YES
5/6
Bonus – Amazon comes out with Alexa powered wireless earbuds – because I want them. NO
Jason
- Grocery gets disrupted by digital (led by curbside pickup). Digital grocery doubles in US, at least one delivery firm peters out.YES
- Drug gets disrupted by digital. NO
- AI Gap – biggest trend of 2018 NO
- Voice – Huge but not for commerce. YES
- Payments – Retail digital wallets die (except Starbucks/Walmart/Amazon). Bitcoin tanks. YES
3/5
Bonus – Amazon launches a wearable. NO .
Scot crushes Jason!
2019 Predictions
Scot
- At least 5k more store closures in 2019
- Amazon – Prof Galloway is big on Amazon having to create a AWS spinoff and has moderated that to tracking stock. I’m going to predict Amazon doesn’t do either of those things. But this WILL be the year they break ads out.
- eBay/Alibaba – I think this is the year when the both need to do something big and the stars are aligning for a combination there.
- Shopify gets acquired by one of the big ad-based companies (facebook/google most likely)
- Walmart stumbles in e-commerce
Jason
- Amazon store count exceeds 1000 stores
- Walmart buys a last mile firm
- Another big bankruptcy (going to be a tougher than expected year, JCP, category killers Office, BBBY, Neiman)
- Mobile commerce revenue passes Desktop – Aided by PWA’s, and payment API’s we see mobile gap narrow
- Fads (Voice Commerce, Customer facing AI, SocialCommerce, VR BlockChain)
Bonus: Amazon breaks out Prime revenue.
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Episode 159 of the Jason & Scot show was recorded on Sunday, January 6th, 2019.
New beta feature – Google Automated Transcription of the show
Transcript
Jason:
[0:24] Welcome to the Jason and Scott show this is episode 159 being recorded on Sunday January 6th 2019 I’m your host Jason retailgeek Goldberg and as usual I’m here with your co-host Scott Wingo.
Scot:
[0:39] Hey Jason and welcome back and happy New Year Jason Scott show listeners Jason am I mistaken or is that some new music we have there at the beginning.
Jason:
[0:48] Yeah yeah due to overwhelming listener feedback that I finally updated the
the intro to the show it is the same song and the the same announcer but
you know you and I both both had some career accomplishments in that in the last year until now there are titles are updated and it’s you know just kind of refreshed for the year.
Scot:
[1:13] Yeah and you how is the new gig going for anyone that missed for smashing on you if you missed any of our last couple episodes but Jason has a new gig will see if I can remember this Chief Grand Superior
digital retail Commerce officer is that the right now.
Jason:
[1:31] The for the second time in a row you nailed it exactly right.
Scot:
[1:35] Awesome my dad sometimes I drop a word in there but I think I got them all.
Jason:
[1:38] Yep and impacted cuz you mark that title so much in the last episode I had a ton of a client with legitimately fancy titles all making fun of me for the for the entire break so thanks very much for that Scott.
Scot:
[1:52] Awesome it’s maybe that will be everyone’s New Year’s resolution is to give Jason a hard time about his awesome new title.
Jason:
[1:58] For for sure.
Scot:
[2:00] Coldwell we’re post holidays here I think everyone’s probably on the edge of their seat did you get any cool new gadgets.
Jason:
[2:12] Ya always tough.
Like in general there’s an extremely narrow gap between my desires and fulfillment in so.
Like if I got some new gadgets for Christmas it’s most likely because a new Gadget came out right before Christmas so I will say I did some refresh is I finally got the.
The iPad Pro the 10.5% sync you also have I haven’t unbent version I’ve been pretty.
Pretty happy with that and because because of the new job I had to trade out laptops and so now I have finally have a in all USB C.
Ecosystem with the iPad and the the the laptop so I’ve getting those new gadgets of course cost me thousands of dollars in new adapters and cables in.
And all angles but I guess the one minor little toy I got is a new.
A video camera well I got a couple new vision cameras so I got the DJI osmo pocket.
Scot:
[3:24] Nice.
Jason:
[3:25] This is a tiny as in fits like in the palm of your hand you could you could hide it in your hand video camera with a a fully-functioning gimbal so it’s,
pretty cool to have some some.
Funny pictures I’m looking forward to taking nap to the several upcoming trade shows that will probably talk about in a minute so that has been cool and I did a little earlier than Christmas get the new Nikon.
Mirrorless camera system so a Nikon Zed 6 if you’re from your upper or a Z6 if you’re in the US.
Scot:
[4:01] Cool house that is the mirror listen can you tell the difference.
Jason:
[4:05] Yet yet so Nikon has always had a great reputation for digital still cameras and great
image quality in low-light capability in the color rendering they’ve been extraordinary really horrible at video.
And I’m assuming I actually need a camera that’s.
Okay it Stills and also very good at video so the fact that I’ve always own Nikon cameras and have Nikon lenses have been.
A constant pain point for me because my car’s been so far behind on video and so there’s some the mirrorless cameras in general are much better at video and this this.
Nikon’s first mirrorless full-frame camera.
Really does a pretty good weed frog for video capabilities in a lot of ways so it’s it’s definitely the best.
Video stills camera I’ve ever owned.
Scot:
[5:01] Koba I know you’re off to CES next week and we will have a lot more gadget news for us then you and I are both at the NRF Big Show so maybe we’ll shoot some video do a live streaming or something fun like that.
Jason:
[5:12] I will bring all those gadgets why be using them to photograph any cool new gadgets that you got for the holiday stuff.
Scot:
[5:19] I I said William like you where I think I probably had caught up on my gadgets before the holiday suit so nothing new for me.
Oh yeah yeah I do think did you get the keyboard case on your iPad I really enjoyed that.
Jason:
[5:35] Yeah I did I’ve enjoyed that it’s been it’s my first iPad with a pencil so that has been it’s been cool yeah.
Not permanently I I will concede to have misplaced it but it it does reemerged.
Scot:
[5:51] That an airpods have this weird like they want to get lots of gaple somehow his program them to is a margin enhancer to get lost as quickly as they possibly can.
Jason:
[6:02] I’m afraid to even talk about that because my my wife is so much more responsible than me and she’s on like her her like 4th or 5th pair and I am still in my originals through some some like and Candy miracle.
Scot:
[6:15] Goodwill as is our tradition here on the Jason Scott show every year we kick off the new year with a recap of what happened in the last year
and then we have our predictions so the predictions are twofold last year about 365 days ago we made a bunch of predictions
couldn’t remember so it’s kind of fun to go back and look at those are super geeky and want to go back that was episode 112.
It’s a method that means we did 47 shows last year so that’s 47 hours roughly of Jason Scott if you if you have a week to burn if you have mono or something like that that you want to recover from and you need something to put you to sleep for 47 hours a week we have your cure
so we will be breaking the show into three pieces for going to do kind of a good bad ugly of 2018
and then we can go into recapping our predictions and squirm and then from 2018 and then we’re going to put out some 2019 predictions so I think what you’ll see from the 28th
predictions is we’re actually pretty good pretty good at this thing after how long you been at this 3 for years now I think we’re getting pretty good on the prediction game.
Jason:
[7:34] That’s easier for you to say than it is for me to say this year but sure.
Scot:
[7:39] Without further delay let’s jump into The Good the Bad and the Ugly Jason what order a couple of your goods from 2018.
Jason:
[7:46] Yep so I was really excited to see some of the new physical store Concepts and the very end of the year you know Nike open at House of innovation we talked about that in the last show
that’s super exciting to me I think some of the Amazon Concepts like go and 4-star are are super interesting there’s a lot of new
physical Marketplace Concepts like we’ve had beta on the show I’ve mentioned show failed before and then a lot of these mobile-first stores like the Sam’s Club now so I think,
the you know we’re really starting to see digital Impact Physical stores and drive new store Concepts which is awesome.
[8:24] On the platform front I was excited to see Adobe make the big investment in Magento in an e-commerce platform.
In many ways I feel like the the commercial platform space in the Enterprise platform space in particular that I play in is kind of.
In the worst spot it’s been in in 10 years in terms of.
You don’t really meeting the needs of retailers and clients and there’s always been this this conflict between CMS systems that people like Adobe make and commerce platforms that people like.
IBM sap in Oracle make in so I’m very optimistic that adobe who who is dominating the CMAs.
Essbase then making a significant investment investment in e-commerce you know really could be the way forward for 4.
A lot of new new retailers in in Commerce entities that need an enterprise-class system.
And I say this with the one caveat Magento as it is is not the solution.
[9:33] Adobe’s willingness to invest in Magento 2 me is historically a Dobby is always been a.
And aggressive acquire that acquired a bunch of stuff and you know it often takes them several years to really integrate the stuff so I’m not expecting Miracles this year per se but in the long run feels like.
Adobe deciding that Commerce is an important part of the stack is super exciting and then my my last good for the year.
Is kind of specific it was Walmart’s investment in Flipkart in the reason I think that is good I think it is super smart for.
From Walmart to be aggressively fighting for digital in in the super important Emerging Market in India.
Some things happened late last year that make those Investments actually look a little softer is as a Indian regulation on foreign Commerce is has gotten more challenging but the reason I just think it’s good overall is.
I feel like that investment that huge investment in digital for Walmart you know his is the most.
[10:38] Tangible physical manifestation of Walmart’s absolute recognition that.
Digital is the way forward in the day you know that they have to compete with the Amazon than alibaba’s of the world and can’t can’t abdicate any of that Digital Ground And so seeing them them fight for for that that
intellectual property you know I think is a encouraging sign for all of us in the future what about you what would it were you excited about last year Scott.
Scot:
[11:07] Well I’m always the guy that gets to say it wouldn’t be the Jason Scott show without Amazon and Sonos surprised they’re my good is crying it out with Amazon so
I thought was really interesting than Amazon you mentioned a little bit but they really expanded their store footprint so they had acquired Whole Foods back and 17 which obviously is a big splash into offline
and they never really expanded Whole Food stores I mean
2018 was a year of kind of adjusting that that acquisition they announce now they’re going to start opening more here in 2019 so that’s going to be interesting to see
I think the surprise for me in an impossible one was done to go experiments and
then just kind of really ramping that up pretty quickly you know I think they built another for 5 is that many more on the way there’s rumors of wars and then
you’re the one thing as I travel around not nearly as much as you but going to various malls and things
I would say pretty much every a mall in the US seems to have an Amazon pop-up store and
I think about all those people I don’t know how many that is it’s how many of these are out there but I think if we looked at.
[12:23] Your class A malls I think there be three or four hundred of them so I wouldn’t be surprised if there was three or four hundred pretty substantial Amazon pop-ups out there so it’s I think that’s pretty interesting and really is a testament to the Amazon.
[12:38] You’re expanding into kind of omni-channel world and get their products in front of more people.
[12:43] I’m done once asked on the front end of Amazon the back end of Amazon that was really interesting this year was what I would call it start a frenetic expansion of.
Delivery capabilities some of this is last mile so they acquire twenty thousand of these Mercedes Sprinter vans I’d be surprised if any listener at least the United States hasn’t seen one of these I see you to a date at this point in my area.
[13:09] And they built a 1099 Network a very clever way kind of taking a page out of FedEx Grounds Playbook where they were actually kind of
put you in the business guarantee you rub you and routes and then boom you’re off and running so I think they got those 20,000 sprinters out there delivering packages and something like
six months which is just pretty crazy about a lot of soccer capabilities so if you’re a third-party now you can use Amazon soccer in your phone at Center
and almost be like little extension of FBA
Whole Foods we saw them can I ditch instacart and then layer and their their 1099 other 1099 network of Flex for that they’ve added a ton more jets that got to where are hubs coming and I attractive
distribution centers pretty closely
so in the USA in 2018 they added 46 more performance center assets and then another 23 in the rest of the world for a total of about 70
I am all in that’s an additional 11 million square feet of space that came on line in 2018 and then that adds to the existing 850 or so globally and 250 million square feet so,
so it’s a lot of people that I always
talk to you that the baby not in the industry but on the cusp there always surprise I’ll say what how many how many from home as soon as you think Amazon has versus Walmart but they both have 10 and the number I think that’s about right with Walmart but Amazon has.
[14:34] Tremendous amount of assets they built so it matters it’s Amazon a so far ahead of anyone it is going to be interesting to see there.
My last surprise was becoming I think the economy did really well last year even the last
reported as of December on the job side was really really strong so that we’re seeing a strong economy you know as the Fed
kind of Titans interest rates in the stock market with a lot of shakiness there but underlying economy.
[15:09] Then let’s put it in the battle I’ll start those so I think the bad was I was so surprised about how kind of negative to Amazon hq2 process turned out,
kind of ended in a in a thud you know it wasn’t like this kind of I guess unless you’re one of the two cities I think they’re.
Pretty excited but even then there’s a lot of protesting going on in the DC New York area that Amazon’s coming and then it got these really big incentives so
yeah I think that’s going to be interesting to watch and see what happens as Amazon is so large now that they can’t just fly under the radar and I think they managed the back of that process kind of weirdly
not where it seems like everyone that are decided and then and then it’s kind of pain a conspiracy theory if you believe that they were just Gathering data from people
what I’m concerned about a little bit you and I emailed about this just recently I kind of put it in the bad category in this is holiday 2018.
I’m so Adobe came out a couple days ago what their final report they said the holiday came in at 14%.
That’s e-commerce so Little Debbie disappointing if that’s true then you send me some data that showed MasterCard said all in 5.1
I guess you know this better than I do dinner or else was right around there and set right would that be kind of a win or a loss of your.
Jason:
[16:30] Yet so for all of retail that’s that that’s probably a win it’s a little better than the recent historical averages but I think the.
That does averages hide the fact that you know it just was not equal 4 for all retailers and inside I definitely think there are winners and losers.
Scot:
[16:54] Yeah unfortunately don’t think we’ll know until Amazon reports there they’re kind of the Bellwether I look at and you know,
Indus. Where they would have pre-announced if they had missed so they haven’t said anything unfortunately Apple did pronounce look like they had a really rough calendar Q4 I believe it’s there there
theraphysical q1i which is always confusing what companies do it that way
but that seems to be isolated to China with some of the tariffs and things in the Chinese economy that that I don’t think we’ll
Amazon has as much exposure to just really interesting to see where holiday 18 and zup and I think we’ll know what covered on the show as we always do I think we’ll know
by that first week in February however all the all the leaves fell and and what happened.
Jason:
[17:41] Yeah I’m looking forward to seeing how that all plays out so some of my bads.
Didn’t get a ton of Buzz last year but I’ve been pretty disappointed in the outcome of the Supreme Court ruling regarding a internet sales tax and so you know,
basically the Supreme Court rule made a ruling in favor of a state that was suing to collect sales tax on.
An internet sales in Oxy like I’m okay with.
People having to pay sales tax for other online purchases I’m I actually think in general rather be Universal pricing and in.
You know you buy from the same retail online or in the store you want to see the same price and and that’s a lot to be taxed in a similar way the reason I say that the ruling was bad is.
Because a bunch of the ramifications of the way this particular ruling plays out it just creates a lot of uncertainty in friction in the e-commerce space and so.
Which states you actually need to collect sales tax in which they tax you definitely don’t need to collect sales tax in and which states.
You may or may not get sued by a state if you don’t collect sales tax in right now is kind of.
[19:02] Thrown up in the air and it creates a lot of inconsistency and just a lot of.
A sort of effort and friction that isn’t helping anyone and so I feel like there was opportunity for for Congress to solve this problem before dumping in the lap of the Supreme Court’s and.
You know maybe that was overly optimistic so didn’t happen until we’re going to have to let this play out for now a number of years and.
Just like the unfortunate the other sort of bad one to me this year is we had some kind of ugly CEO exit so you know what we forgot about that this far end up but we had.
You know the very ugly exit at Lululemon.
[19:44] Early in the year I want to see February he was he was the CEO and chairman and got kind of forced out and he’s now been.
In an irritant for them on an ongoing basis you know Mickey Drexler was.
Lasted less than a year of J.Crew and you know maybe not CEO of all but you know I see you judge executive term for some bad reasons it Nike.
And so you know that certainly to me as one of the the the bad blemishes on on 2018 from a Commerce perspective.
[20:19] And then my my ugly if we give it to the the really bad stuff for 2018 I just think it what I mean you’re always going to have churning in retail stores are always going to have,
bankruptcies Doug mcmillon famous what he carries around this west of the top 10.
[20:36] Can retailers from my 1980 and there aren’t a lot of those names that are that are still in business today so bankruptcies are in a shock but I feel like.
2018 hits is particularly hard with Toys R Us and Sears and then you know below them you had all these other guys David’s Bridal Mattress Firm Brookstone Nine West Claire’s Gymboree bonds.
Etc and so you know as a lover of Commerce and Retail and sorry to see some of those stories brands.
[21:07] You don’t go away or get greatly diminished so that’s only felt ugly and then right towards the end of the year,
we had a IBM sell their big Enterprise e-commerce platform Webster Commerce to US service provider HCL,
that to me is a probably super ugly for IBM clients that are relying on that platform and.
You know now it’s fragmented from the rest of the IBM stacked and there’s going to be a bunch of challenges there there’s a bunch of clients that own the or just moving to the.
The cloud version of Webster Commerce which they didn’t sell so that seems ugly I just feel like the the Enterprise Commerce platform space.
In general is in a bad space and it’s most manifested by by IBM which was you know one of the top three platforms are arguably the top platform getting kind of dumped by IBM this year.
Scot:
[22:08] Call yeah I’m going to plus one or as my kids would say retweet on the bankruptcies that tear you when was painfully know is that it is a kid that grew up
Star Wars fan I spent many a midnight madness so you know.
Jedi Friday or whatever the column hanging out in t r u so that was disappointing then you.
Add insult to injury one of the shopping center if we go to a lot had a combined Tru Babies R Us like a huge one it just sitting there empty for the last last three or four months is kind of sad.
Yeah I kind of say you know in this top of the mall Denton,
so interesting stat here that came out towards the end of the year.
I mentioned it, he did pretty well but malls were there emptiest in six years from a tenancy standpoint no foot traffic is also down at malls this company RI sorry is I had a report that said that they’re at an 8.6% vacancy.
[23:05] Again that’s the highest it’s been in 6 years and that represents 4 million square foot is the most available square footage in malls and then strip malls have been hit
chick really bad because you know I think Toys R Us is really kind of one of those strip-mall type stores that
it was an anchor for a lot of strip malls and and as we see in the enclosed malls when she loosened his anchors you get up into this death spiral kind of situation so
I would also Echo that on the ugly side
cool so so that was kind of the what was sawed in 2018 let’s put it to our predictions in and see if how Clairvoyant we were on condos so I went back to Good Ol episode 112 and service predictions I’ll go to mine and then you go to yours and then what kind of see how he did
sue her quickly I had five predictions and a bonus so number one Mulligan 2.0
in 2017 we saw 7,000 stores closed and I said it’s going to accelerate into 2018.
[24:05] I ended up with 9,000 closures then my second prediction was that Amazon will not buy another retailer
this doesn’t seem like people may think well why would you say that it’s kind of obvious but back then we were on the heels of the Whole Foods acquisition in a lot of Wall Street analyst for like issuing those reports you know Costco’s Definitely Maybe the next company know it’s Nordstrom’s know its Target so that’s that was kind of the backdrop.
Predictions is really say these guys are off base I just don’t think Amazon’s could do anything big again in 2018,
in the corollary to that was that they would instead of doing that they would triple down on private label.
[24:44] Third prediction I ripped my prediction on Amazon Logistics they would be competing more squarely with FedEx ups and then number for this one turned out,
pretty good I said Walmart will make
big m&a instacart Postmates and eBay so, playing on Marketplace and last-mile their number 5 and said somebody would acquire magenta or they would go.
And then my bonus was the Amazon would come out with Alexa powered,
your butt’s so I mentioned airpods the topless show I love my airpods but I am not a huge Siri fan and I everyday I wish Alexa what would hang out on my airpods instead of Siri so that was the Genesis of that production Warrior 2018 predictions.
Jason:
[25:30] Yep so I also had five in the bonus the first one was the grocery would get heavily disrupted by digital I think I called out specifically that would be wed by curbside pickup.
Number two was the drug would get the heavily disrupted by digital,
number three I said the biggest train would be talking about in 2018 was what I called that AI gap which was kind of,
the difference between the big players that could take full advantage of AI in the smaller players that couldn’t necessarily afford to do it as quickly,
predictions for was voice I said it’s going to continue to be huge and grow quickly but not for Commerce.
And then my V prediction was mobile payments was digital wallets I said a bunch of them with. I said Starbucks Walmart and Amazon when continue to thrive but a bunch of the other ones women’s and,
snarky side note I mentioned that I expected Bitcoin to tank and then my bonus was.
Close to the same as yours I I said that I thought the Amazon would come out with a wearable in 28.
Scot:
[26:42] What did you what you mean by Rebel.
Jason:
[26:45] Army night.
Your paws were the most likely scenario but I just felt like they would find some way to get Alexa on on your body and especially because they lack the phone that seems like.
You don’t like it could be some kind of widget that you you clip to your clothing or or carry with you but but or I wear something like that but I guess my biggest expectation was that it would be your pot.
And we will talk about the results of that moment early but I want to start off by breaking down how well you did
so now that we reminded everyone what we thought 2018 would look like in the beginning of 2018 let’s see how we actually did so your first prediction was the store Mulligan what do you think.
Scot:
[27:38] Yeah I’m going to because I put a specific number in there of 9,000 I I I missed that one turns out it took me a while to find the state looks like there was 6235 closures
in hindsight what I should have done and there’s no good data set for this is looked at the square footage of so you know when
I don’t know when a mattress firm closes that’s different than a Sears or JCPenney are Toys R Us closing right
is this really the square footage we care about so I would argue I would throw myself at the feet of the judges and say look at miss the number of stores but I think if you look at kind of what did clothes and yours juices
rundown of store closures in 2018 Toys R Us 735,
Walgreens 600 n Taylor Loft Dress Barn 500 Teavana 379 Best Buy 250 Mattress Firm 200 Gap
200 Children’s Place 144 Footlocker 110 Kmart 109 Gymboree 102 and then let’s goes It goes from there another kind of big square footage when Sam’s Club 63 how big is a Sam’s Club like two hundred thousand.
Jason:
[28:49] 100 weeks but yeah.
Scot:
[28:50] Honored yet so there’s enough so it’s all right I think if we looked as square footage I bet and I don’t have a source for this unfortunately I have heard that the there was way more square footage in 2018 so.
Who does if you want to hold it till I rely on the stop.
Jason:
[29:08] Yeah I’m actually giving you that one because I would,
went out do I call the sources we do have the track store closures none of them claim or try to be comprehensive so they’re they’re tracking stores in a particular category or that made a particular criteria and saying they close that many but none of them for example are trying to keep track of.
Potentially how many mom-and-pop closed or those sorts of things and even there are a couple of sources of square footage in your right the square footage is more dramatic because we had closure is it a lot of big stores but even the square footage tend to be like.
People that are attacking mob a square footage in what the closures are so I just I don’t think there is a definitive number but I think the spirit of your prediction came to pass and I think was the.
The biggest shrinkage of a store for stores in in recent memory.
Scot:
[29:59] Colton so we’ll call that one in the sky cam.
Jason:
[30:05] For sure so your second prediction Amazon will not buy another offline retailer and you said they’d triple down on private label so pretty with B,
and I prediction but but I actually.
I liked it so how do you think you did.
Scot:
[30:24] Predictions
so obviously I didn’t make another big acquisition of an offline retailer in it you know the trouble down on private label I think
maybe they even quadruple down that it’s hard to get data on the cell to does a good job and then we had some other data folks 10:10 to concentrate on the show and you know I think if you could attract our conversations on the show or the squeeze 7 episodes
the second half of 18 we were spending a lot of time talking about Amazon 3rd party because it’s probably the number one thing on retailers and Brands mines
you know so so so I would call this definitely something that happened there.
Jason:
[31:12] That for sure, annoyingly totally giving it to you so 242 so far your third prediction which I touch you like is your annual protection,
is the Amazon Logistics.
Scot:
[31:30] Yeah and this one’s kind of squishy so I’m going to kind of say this was a zero so my mind we won’t cross this one until
I can ship a product on Amazon like I would FedEx from point A to point B.
So I think it’s become insanely cleared everyone that this is what they’re building now so I think everyone is kind of,
in fact if you if you go look at a FedEx stock chart and you’ll see they had a number of issues with the terrorist it help them it would not,
listen to their conference call their CEO and founder Fred Smith,
you got a little agitated by a kind of the fifth or sixth Amazon question that he got so I think it’s
become pretty apparent everyone would Amazon’s doing here and the the ball is no longer hidden the cards are on the table
and who knows maybe 2019 will be that year when we can ship a product Coast to Coast for $3 on Amazon.
Jason:
[32:31] Yeah for sure so I’m sort of with you I feel like they made a lot of progress in that direction
seems like you need to be something that will happen but but you don’t get full credit for this year so if only because I need to keep the predictions competitive,
so your fourth prediction was the Amazon the ad group we get so large that they would have to break out there the revenue separately and that people would be totally shocked how how big they got
so quickly.
Scot:
[33:04] Yeah and so did this is a win they didn’t have to break it out like they do AWS work so I could separate kind of reporting piano but they have had to break it out because it has been so large they created this
they when they announced the quarter last year they said going forward they would change the way they recorded stuff.
Unfortunately they stopped recording a lot of my favorite stuff which was kind of sad so they used to have this
interesting breakdown between him and some things that have gone away now but when they did that they did start to break out
category called other and everyone knows that that’s like 99% and so and it has gotten quite large so you’ll hear me talk a little bit more about that in 2019 president.
Jason:
[33:50] Yeah and you don’t even though you’re bad at reading predictions and you put that highly specific thing in there that didn’t happen I’m totally giving this one to you like for people that haven’t lived through the industry in last year
people are not talking about Amazon’s ad Revenue in January of last year in
you don’t even like the Scott Galloway’s of the world that like make a living.
Making predictions and then you know reminding everyone when they’re right he wrote a book that you don’t Amazon with 1/4 of the book and he barely mentioned advertising in that book in like,
July and so for you back in January to have said hey there ads is going to be this big thing and it was going to be shocked when they find out how big it was and then you know
last June and then again in October when they you know,
showed how fast that was growing and everyone’s exactly talking about that I feel like you you basically put the words right in there was a mouth so I’m totally giving you credit for that but you still ain’t get one point for it so
so you’re three or four running into to your V prediction which was that.
Annoying Walmart will make a big MMA and you mentioned some some last-mile candidates.
Scot:
[35:08] Yeah.
Jason:
[35:09] How you did Scott.
Scot:
[35:10] I’ll give you sixteen Billy syneresis flag,
Walmart acquired what card it was not one of the ones that predicted but.
You know I probably should have so it was my my set up on this one going back then was,
it’s not like Walmart had all this pressure you know that they had to get in the game with with Amazon more and I was thinking Last Mile but it totally makes sense on their National side as well so that was,
clearly a good call to kind of read the tea leaves on that one.
Jason:
[35:48] Yeah that was totally good and then annoyingly even though they were only supposed to be 5 predictions you did 1/6 prediction and you know
to be annoyingly for me cuz I I’m I have this one-sided rivalry when I’m trying to compete with you I believe your 6 prediction was that a Dobby would acquire Magento for 1.6 billion dollars.
Scot:
[36:07] It wasn’t that accept fake but it was that someone would acquire Majin to or they would go public so so there you know
so having been on the other side of this
when when you get to a certain scale as a startup in the magenta got through some complicated things but they’re effectively a start up again right there an independent entity they had a private equity
the clock starts ticking was what I was thinking
and what that clock means is that investor wants their money back and he’s private Equity guys BC’s want a 10-year Horizon private equities like two or three that was kind of feeding into that prediction and then you know it’s also on the other side it’s.
Musical chairs you know so so everyone every big cloud he’s going to want to have a great platform and it just felt like there was.
One chair left in and kind of two Cloud companies that wanted to sit in that chair so so that’s what it said in the so happy that I read those tea leaves right as well.
Jason:
[37:07] What congratulations so recap five out of six right and then you did do the bonus one
and that was the Amazon would have an airpod like headphones they and what it what do you want to say about that stuff.
Scot:
[37:23] So my strategy here is it’s easy to call this when the wind because you had the same one so your Prime.
So Amazon specifically didn’t get released this but this is actually my son was looking for some new headphones so we went to,
I would assume next to the derelict Toys’R’Us I mentioned earlier and I was surprised I’m a big I’m listening I’m on the show right now with some qc35 from Bose
and I looked and it said now featuring Alexa and I was like what the heck,
this is awesome now Alexa is in the Bose headphones then I went over to the job or display and it said now featuring Alexa then I went over to like two other kind of you know
generic style things and literally as I backed up and looked at the row of headphones every single pair suddenly I had Alexa so what’s happened is Amazon has issued an API or some kind of capability in
a very strategically work with a lot of these manufacturers and unbeknownst to me until now literally like January 2nd when we were born in some.
[38:29] Best Buy gift cards they are there are a lot of airpod like Technologies and and you have every configuration headphone you can imagine with Alexa now
and I play with it it’s actually exactly how I want it to be so
on my Gadget which list is I am hoping that somehow these Bose headphones I have break and that I can.
Get a new pair with Alexa or maybe I need to go check and see if I can retro them to have Alexa probably not try some kind of I’m sure there’s some.
Gizmo this to make me buy a new car.
Jason:
[39:02] Yea though I can certainly help you with the accidental breakage problem when I see you in in New York in a couple weeks
but yeah yeah same boat I I’m not giving it either this credit for this cuz the Amazon didn’t didn’t actually,
come out with an Amazon branded product but what did happen I can’t remember the exact date like August or September they did finally release exactly as you suggested an API that made it totally possible for
OEM to build Alexa into the headphones and you can imagine folks are doing it right then
but then even a bigger deal one of the big chip manufacturers in November started shipping a new Bluetooth chipset
the included that capability and access to that API in the chips at so
you’re already seeing a bunch of announcements that’s before.
Brands had the opportunity to build new products with this new Bluetooth chipset my expectation is I’m going to show up in Las Vegas tomorrow
and there are going to be Bluetooth products with an Alexa embedded in them coming out of my ears with early.
So I think we yeah we may have missed The Branding on that one but the floodgates are about to open up and
not one of my predictions but sidenote like I think everyone’s noticed that.
[40:24] Airpods have been Apple’s most successful product in The Last 5 Years and you know the.
The Amazon Alexa family’s been the most successful Consumer Electronic it in The Last 5 Years,
I’ll be shocked if we don’t see apple Google and Amazon directly battling it out with smart smart earbuds this year.
Scot:
[40:44] Cool one of the one of the many Jason Scott show interns just handed me a note it looks like I can upgrade my headphones with firmware so we’re going to stop a show right now.
Jason:
[40:58] We’re not going to stop at but you may not hear Scott anymore cuz he’s going to like drop by the audio.
Scot:
[41:03] I’m going to be upgrading my firmware while Jason finishes the wrestler show speaking of Jason let’s go through your predictions so what was my score so was it 5 out of 7.
Jason:
[41:13] I forgot I forgot what it was I’m giving you five out of six we’re not counting the bone.
Scot:
[41:18] Okay but I think that helps you but I’m okay with.
Jason:
[41:21] Well but we’re also the setting it was the same bonus oh.
Scot:
[41:24] Okay so your first one was grocery gets disrupted by digital led by curbside pickup listeners will longtime listeners will know that is your favorite.
Grocery solution digital grocery doubles in the US at least one delivery firm Peters out.
Jason:
[41:41] Yep so,
I’m calling out a window side note I have come to realize that I hate my predictions from last year and because I just,
put them badly like they’re too subjective and in many cases like hard to measure so at one of my New Year’s resolution is to write better
predictions and we’ll find out how very shortly.
Scot:
[42:05] It’s easy to say you hate them in January of 2019.
Jason:
[42:08] Yeah for sure for sure but but I do think the sentiment of this when like was wildly true
Walmart ruled after I pick up to 2,000 stores that over 40% e-commerce growth every quarter this year which is wildly faster than last year is faster than Amazon Kroger get a bunch of their own curbside pickup called quick list but a bigger deal they did an exclusive partnership with Arcado the
biggest digital Grocer in UK Albertsons made a bunch of big Investments they both
announced that they were going to watch the first digital grocery Marketplace and they also announced that they were going to build dedicated micro fulfillment centers out of the backs of a bunch of the Albertsons stores
our friends at shoptalk launched a dedicated digital grocery show called grocery talk and it’s sold out with 3,000 attendees in the first year you know you go internationally and the
the Ali Baba concept hammer and the JD concept 7 fresh are going nuts I think it’s it’s a safe and fair to say
digital grocery blew up even even though.
You know I mean I have perfectly nailed the specifics and again there’s no perfect metric but it does appear that digital grocery more than doubled in the US.
Scot:
[43:28] Wood shed delivery from Peter.
Jason:
[43:30] Yeah that’s the part where I sort of depends on how you count right like you could argue that like one that got acquired like shipped for example.
Scot:
[43:42] Oh that’s like tripled.
Jason:
[43:44] Not with any retailer besides Target.
And I think I mean you know there’s there’s something there on the ropes a little bit but yeah that was a dumb part of the prediction so you can you’re going to trust me anyway so don’t you don’t need a whole night.
Scot:
[44:00] Oh when writing predictions don’t don’t like a daisy chain hands together because.
Jason:
[44:06] When specifics yeah yeah.
2 + 1 is that is that I’m one-for-one right now feel free to stop listening to schoenauer.
Scot:
[44:17] Okay the judges give you that one okay because we’re going to flip your aunt’s to Anor and give you one there alright your second prediction was drugs get disrupted by digital.
Jason:
[44:30] Yeah and I mean a few things did happen that are interesting Amazon invested a billion dollars in pillpack they wash their first over-the-counter brand basic care
they partnered to do that like at home medical devices under the choice brand of course there’s this big joint health care venture between Amazon Berkshire Hathaway and JP Morgan
but to me none of that adds up to a true disruption yet and I I mean I think there’s some
is there a lot of interesting tea leaves to read this year but I’m I’m not going to argue that I should get a point there.
Scot:
[45:12] All right and then your third prediction was the biggest trend of 2018 will be the AI Gap.
Jason:
[45:21] So once again a stupid prediction how do you argue something is or isn’t the biggest Trend but I think it’s safe to say this wasn’t so I kind of miss this one like you know I do think.
Aai was one of the hype things that got a lot of chatter in 2018 and there was one IPO that you could argue with sort of AI Commerce which is Stitch fix
realistically like I didn’t I don’t think we saw a i dramatically transformed any retailers and so my my way more specific prediction that.
Did the it would open a gap between the big retailers in the little retailers why I just don’t think it’s fair to say that happened so that was a dumb prediction and I’m I’m not one for 3.
Scot:
[46:06] Okay I’ll see how you did a number for you said his voice is going to be huge but not for Commerce.
Jason:
[46:14] Yeah so again based on my fragile ego I feel like this one is climbing out of the hole a little bit
I do think of voice was huge I think Amazon alone has said they sold over a hundred million devices now it’s their best-selling device on all their big days
that there’s some by some metrics Google is actually.
Selling more devices in the last couple quarters than Amazon I’m not sure I totally believe that but but I do believe they’re selling a bunch of devices as well until for sure,
voice over all was huge and I think even more clearly voice commerce was not there was some some data that came out in the third quarter that said that
less than 2% of people that own smart speakers that ever tried to do Commerce with it feel like the only only even moderate volume,
Commerce type applications were things like a Starbucks in the Uber for sure people are not ordering things with.
Complicated attributes and in promo codes via there their voice devices self.
Again I’m going to take the win there and which would put me at 2 for 4.
Scot:
[47:32] Does that hundred million devices suppression.
Jason:
[47:36] No because I mean some very low-cost devices we haven’t talked that an issue I don’t think that they now even have like
and you can frequently get devices free and as part of bundles but they never liked him $19 device that you can plug into any speaker.
And so they they just have all the price points in there you know there,
is you highlighted there a huge advertising platform than one of that biggest biggest media platforms on the on the planet and they generally dedicate about half of all their pixels to selling this stuff so I mean.
Today I am not shocked they sold that many devices if you if you ask me in a 3 years ago when they started this stuff if they would get there this past I probably would have said that shot.
Scot:
[48:21] So just like
one way I think about this is probably 80% domestic 20% International I don’t think they push the Alexa stuff is hard International so then to the pilot 89 us net,
that article is totally undermined right is global High thing.
Jason:
[48:40] Yeah I think that was a global number.
Scot:
[48:42] There’s three hundred and fifty people are in the US 250 households 200 million households.
Jason:
[48:51] Little north of 200.
Scot:
[48:52] Yes it was just going to round numbers 200 million households 80 million devices there’s going to be some
like your house that has 30 devices but that’s like we on this Edge Neo so you know call it’s approaching half us households have an Alexa device that’s pretty amazing.
Jason:
[49:13] Yeah for sure but it is I feel like it is pres been on them like they’re lots of devices that get to that.
That 50% market share eventually and it depends on the technology took a long time but I do think one of the ramifications of the like modern digital era is.
That all of this happens much faster so you know it.
Adoption of new things just happens much more quickly than it did in the ear of radio or TV and so you know smart speakers, you know followed a similar trajectory to a lot of those other media technologies that they just did it in a way I can press time.
Scot:
[49:47] God I wish I could give you two on this one but it’s been our custom to just give one point prediction so sorry.
Jason:
[49:53] Yeah totally totally fair.
Scot:
[49:56] Then your payments so you said retail die.
And Bitcoin tanks so you didn’t and in there.
Jason:
[50:11] So like you got him like me for my poor Boolean logic
and again stupidly written like I call that some specific digital wallets that were the exceptions and those exceptions
large we did really well Starbucks did very well on there some evidence that Walmart did well Amazon you know his continuing to thrive is a digital wallet
I didn’t spell out the digital wallets that wouldn’t do well but in my mind there were two families of those there’s Apple and Google which,
like all indications are are pretty flat so there are people using them in liking them but it but it does not appear that they’re growing particularly fast and it doesn’t appear that they’re getting as much reuse as,
I’m sure they would hope so so our friends over it payments that that
track this like it kind of found ample in Google to be flat and then there was this whole genre of digital wallets from financial institutions so specific Banks like Chase and Citibank and the card issuers like MasterCard and visa and.
[51:13] Yeah none of those digital wallets are used by anyone that’s not a family member of the company so I do feel like that that is fair and then stupidly put a hand in there
4 Bitcoin that had nothing to do with digital wallet so I have no idea why I did that but that is arguably,
my best prediction of the entire thing because I think Bitcoin was at $16,000 a coin and in that is the beginning of January that you wanted me to prediction and today it’s at about 3:36 hundred bucks so it’s
basically a quarter of its its former value so if you if you wanted to invest in any prediction in this entire,
in N last year’s entire show the most money you could have made was to take my advice and short bed.
Scot:
[51:59] Unless you were a Magento investor.
Are Flipkart okay and then finally you said Amazon will come out in the wearable and I think you have already dismissed.
Jason:
[52:14] Yeah yeah thank you you are to cover that one so so I think you add all that up I’m I’m three out of five you’re for it at 5 but with a like a much richer more impressive for.
Scot:
[52:26] Cool thank you I appreciate the kikuta sir I think you did a good job but hopefully you learned some some important lessons about writing your predictions and let’s let’s jump into that you want to go first you want me to go first.
Jason:
[52:39] I want to go first, before you jump in and in case we have any that overlap.
Scot:
[52:45] Are you good for.
Jason:
[52:46] So my first prediction is that Eddie Lampert is not going to launch a space exploration company.
Wait wait that’s all right so cheating just making fun of your negative predictions
but I do like that one if anyone wants to keep it as my bonus my first one I guess I’m trying to have more measurable objective things I think
continuing the the evolution of Amazon’s brick-and-mortar I think Amazon is going to have more than a thousand brick-and-mortar stores by the end of this year,
combination of goes Whole Foods in some other expansion of bookstore Concepts
but a thousand stores is a very meaningful brick-and-mortar retailers so if you go to like the
the NRF top list of retailers and you sort it by number of stores
a thousand stores makes you about the the 67th,
largest retailer in the US by number of stores and so in addition to all the other areas where Amazon’s excelling in.
And dominating I feel like eating that thousands door threshold like definitely makes you as usually credible brick-and-mortar retailer and I think they’re going to get there this year.
Scot:
[54:04] Do you want to throw and and in there about.
Jason:
[54:07] And Eddie Lampert is not going to want to space exploration.
Scot:
[54:10] Okay alright I almost got that in here.
Jason:
[54:14] So then my new strategy is just to take your predictions that didn’t happen from the year before and doubled down on them.
So you last year said Walmart was going to make a big acquisition and you highlighted some of the last mile companies and you got credit for the making the big acquisition but it wasn’t the last mile company,
I think they’re going to fulfill the other half of your prediction this year and actually buy a Last Mile company.
And that’s potentially potentially instacart Postmates taskrabbit but I also think something like that.
Adda live wood would totally toy fit in there so I’m I’m sure we’ll see Walmart both organically grow and acquire.
Let more last-mile capability this year.
[55:07] Number 3 I am sad to say based on our previous conversations but I I think we are going to see another big beloved brand go bankrupt this year so I actually think.
In any way I do I told you I think that it was an unexpectedly good economy this year.
I am not as confident that we’re going to sustain that for all of 2019 and there are you know it again I think that the the booming economy hasn’t been.
Equally generous to all retailer so I do think there’s some retards have had a tough going and I think as both get tightened a little bit that potential will be the last.
The last straw so you know I certainly think the department stores.
You know is a vulnerable category United by JCPenney certainly is vulnerable I think any of the category killers that used to win based on assortment you know aren’t winning an assortment anymore do the online so you know that could be one of the.
The Office Products companies are Bed Bath & Beyond or some of those guys and you know when we talk about department stores.
You don’t one super story brand in the US that you like I think is has a bunch of money a bunch of.
Debt due in 2019 and seemed to be having some some substantial disagreements with her creditors at the moment is Neiman Marcus so I would be sad to see them go but it seems like.
[56:35] Like they’re going to have to do pretty well tough to forestall that so I’m afraid we’ll see another another big bankruptcy this year.
Scot:
[56:43] How many demons are there are they only like four big cities room.
Jason:
[56:47] So it’s not a huge footprint unless it’s 40 spores and they own a couple other Concepts as well but yeah.
Scot:
[56:57] Predictions for 4.
Jason:
[56:59] I feel like I might have made a similar version of this before but the.
I’m bringing it back so mobile the mobile Gap getting narrower is my is my official predictions I think aided by a progressive web apps and payment API we are going to see.
Mobile really catch up to desktop in terms of conversion rate and also total sale so I guess I’ll see you in my dreams specific prediction is.
That we have more mobile Commerce than desktop Commerce in if you take out tablets in 29th.
Scot:
[57:40] And then last but not least.
Jason:
[57:42] Yeah I’m taking you or negative predictions to the extreme and I’m just saying there’s a bunch of pads that I don’t think will will.
Be significant and in 2019 the first one is still going to be hyped this year and still going to be a fad.
I actually don’t think there’s going to be a ton of like customer-facing AI experiences or are frankly even way better personalization experiences in 2019.
I think we will see more more chatter around social commerce but it’s still not going to catch on.
I don’t think going to see any meaningful Traction in in VR for Commerce.
And I certainly don’t think blockchain is going to be a very important element for most of Commerce so that you know there’s the ones you you all of those Technologies are ones you hear people talk about a lot and.
Like I frequently intended rough drafts of retail Trends decks with all these things in a minute I just don’t think any of them are going to be very Signet.
Scot:
[58:44] Any any bonuses you want to put on there.
Jason:
[58:47] I do the you talk about Amazon being forced to break out their ad Revenue do I actually think they’re going to get forced to break out the revenue related to Prime Membership.
And I hope that happens cuz I think it would be super interesting to see what percentage of.
Of their their sales come from Prime and and you don’t total total Prime Revenue in those sorts of things would be fascinating to know.
Scot:
[59:15] Did you include, like a whole p&l there or just really Prime revenue and sales around Prime.
Jason:
[59:22] Yeah I don’t know how specific I want to get on bonus I don’t think I official purposes I won’t say piano but I hope that they have to get as granny or as.
Using Prime members as a segment for reporting Revenue.
So that’s what I got hopefully it’s better than last year hopefully I am I’m not getting.
I hope I am enjoying next year’s version of the show more than I did this year’s but the time we’re finally to the part that I’m really looking forward to which is what Nostradamus thinks is going to happen for next year so Scott what do we got.
Scot:
[1:00:00] Yeah it’s always hard to follow up on him set up pretty good predictions and if you like last year the,
the chessboard was more clearly laid out for me than it is this year and and the
the tilt of the board is really hard so you know we’re coming off a year where the economy was smoking and wages are going up but then we have a lot of changes in the political scene
there’s lots of talk of impeachment there’s like all kinds of craziness the garments closes record this really hard to know which way
the economy is going.
But you know whenever I’m on kind of the fence on these things I tend to be an optimist so it’s my heart for real blood so I’m going to lean towards the positive side of things I think you know hopefully we navigate to all that I know,
Tailwind of a good economy in 2019 as an industry which I think we all agree would be good so.
My first prediction so following on that optimystix thing by first one’s kind of negative so like you I agree we haven’t seen you know.
[1:01:06] The end of this kind of I think it’s a Dominos that are falling and I don’t think a lot of people even kind of put that together yet
so like you seen Sears file Chapter 11 I don’t think many stores come out of that I think we’re down to a handful of Sears that’s going to put pressure on malls I think that puts more pressure on JCPenney. If you look there stocks already down from for $2. The other two are heading into a delisting scenario below a dollar
I don’t know what’s going on with their creditors but all these old-school guys Leverage.
So you get into the stuff spiral it sure does feel like JCPenney’s stuck into that. Spiral they have 860 stores.
[1:01:45] Macy’s is Macy’s is doing really well today,
but once you get stuck into this kind of swirling drain of mall-based retail it’s really hard to get out of there and I do worry that they kind of there a domino that falls in there.
[1:02:01] I’ve already closed some stores to trim their footprint and their 660 more so I don’t think they would do bankruptcy everything but I think they may have to sell some of those stores are closing so I’m going to say at least 5,000 more stores and if we can ever find the square footage I think it’ll be,
about as bad as 2019 so I think 2017-18 was a huge step up 8
1617 and 17 18 wheeler big steps up I think we’ll go sideways which is still going to be pretty bad though because that step up Rick kind of this
5000 larger stores whatever the equivalent Sopranos that I do believe was larger than 2017 just my first pregnancy
second one is you know your your buddy Scott Galway also known as Professor go away he is really big on TV telling everyone that the government’s Crackdown on Amazon and for some spin-off AWS he’s backed off that a little bit and now he’s talking about well
maybe they’ll have to have tracking stock I’m going to predict this is one of my anti production so you can Amazon
doesn’t do those things but this will be the year that they know that adds does get broken out and I’ll be specific here
as its own p&l kind of line out of the bath report because when I kind of build a spreadsheet and it got to take.
Cloud stuff which is AWS and how I think adds is growing and I think.
[1:03:30] Off the record I think you for ads will probably do as much as the rest of 2018 which is going to blow people’s minds but it makes total sense,
me and probably you cuz that’s what you would do if you were
brand new grass is so when I put in a spreadsheet and track them I believe it’s going to be about the same size as AWS by like 20 22 or 23 1 and I’ve seen a couple of Reports say the same thing,
that is my second prediction and just to recap it again they’re going to have to break out they won’t and I put an end in here in tribute to.
To Jason they’re not going to spin or tracking stock AWS but they will have to break out ads.
What’s your prediction is I think too kind of the companies out there and I’ve talked about Amazon and it’s in the ones that are struggling on Mosside you have kind of eBay and Alibaba they had come like what I would call up
computer in 2018 it is kind of you know it wasn’t a great year it wasn’t a bad year
but they both had they have type beat up over the last year at least companies both have leaders that they want to grow and be aggressive,
I feel like something’s going to happen there and when I kind of think about it I’ve always thought this would be a perfect kind of combination so these these two companies just feel like they belong together to me so I’m going to call that there is going to be a combination there.
[1:04:52] Number for and I know she didn’t really make platform prediction
the last platform that last chair kind of out there is Shopify now all the cloud and infection on this all all the cloud guys seem to have kind of bed on their platform rent and I will get them all but I think,
so then you may be single who’s left by like a Shopify and then another footnote is shopify’s really expensive assets oh yeah
honest AC it’s like for 5 billion dollars but it has to be small revenue is going to use super high valuation so whoever buys this that really kind of limits the number of companies that buy it has to be super my prediction here is you have the ad platforms and specifically I’m thinking Google and Facebook,
they’re just getting pummeled right now on the ad side from data collection and and you know all the things about
Russia hacking and all this in front of Congress just getting beat up
I think if I had 100% of my revenue from ads and I was one of those two companies I would be willing to spend a very large sum to diversify That rumney Base because I do think that business model is going to be under
external pressures for a while to mow predictions I think that last seat is taken by either fat Facebook or Google.
[1:06:14] To be an ally bother someone so I’m not to be super specific there but I do think Shopify gets taken out this year and my sis production is kind of an opposite one of you so we’re going to
misaligned on this one I think Walmart has made a couple a lot of big bets over the last year and it’s just really hard to get all this right so so spending that much on Flipkart I think
Amazon shareholder base is in
Amazon Walmart shoulder base isn’t Amazon shareholder base and I think they look at that and they’re kind of like scratching their head and thinking wow I could open a lot more stores I could then X Y and Z you could have written a dividend check so that they have a much different old school
master bass been Amazon does and I think that’s going to put pressure on them this year so it’s a,
prediction is that they’re going to stumble so I think their growth rates going too slow I think they got a lot of early wins from Anna digitalizing the groceries I think a lot of those are one-time pops and,
they are going to get stuck in that to keep that growth up at that and I’m north of what they said 30 40%.
[1:07:18] They have to do some big m&a Flipkart has to go right
zlata has to go right there and I don’t think we have that flexibility to navigate to that I think they’re going to have a run,
I don’t want that to happen so let me be clear I don’t want that to happen I just think it’s the natural progression of these things when you have a year where you put a bunch of bats on the table,
your tab another year we’re not all those bets are going to go well and truly they they’re probably brace for that I think.
[1:07:46] It’s not going to be there nothing about a business or anything but it is going to be a tough year for them I think I’ll do a cover set.
Jason:
[1:07:53] Interesting well I think that’s a terrific sort of
spectrum of predictions between the two of us and that is going to be a perfect place to leave it in the reason I say that is because we always right these show outline that we intend to be 30 45 minutes and I believe I predicted this show would be
70 minutes and right now we’re at 67 minutes so I’m calling it I can be right about one thing it’s how long the show is but
if you are disappointed that we could have shortened you there was something you wanted to discuss that we didn’t get to or you have any questions about the show or ideas for future shows feel free to keep the dialogue going on Facebook you can jump on their pop a question will be happy to chat with you as always we greatly appreciate those five star reviews on iTunes that’s a wonderful belated Christmas present to Scott or I so feel free to
the jump on there and we would greatly appreciate it.
Scot:
[1:08:52] Thanks everyone for joining so hope you enjoyed the first show 2019 happy New Year and we look forward to spending 2019 with you talking about what’s going on in e-commerce retail and the rest of
e-commerce insurance.
Jason:
[1:09:08] Absolutely and so until next time happy commercing.
[…] 2019 Recap – Predictions made on episode 159 […]