IAB: Direct brands move offline to breed chaos among retail traditionalists

New retail models are emerging that challenge traditional players in this space and offer direct-to-consumer brands a route to real-world engagement and sales.

The direct-brand economy has changed – forever – the nature of retailing.

But as Randall Rothenberg, CEO of the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB), reminded some 1,400 delegates at the organization’s 2019 Annual Leadership Meeting, “It is not just an advertising story. The new consumer economy is an intricate, intimate, on-going cycle of creation, communication, consummation, and continuation.”

Moreover, he emphasized, “One of the greatest shifts this new [world] represents is that omnichannel shopping is the new normal.”

Rothenberg supported that declaration with two pieces of IAB flip-sides-of-the-same coin evidence:

  • one in three in-store purchases are made after first shopping digitally;...

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