Best Buy CEO Corrie Barry shared a few lessons learned by the chain on retailing during the pandemic.
In an interview with the Consumer Technology Association CEO Gary Shapiro, Barry also admitted that Best Buy is challenged by product shortages at present.
“If you went to some of our stores right now you would look at the shelves and say, maybe not as much inventory there as you would like to see.” She blamed it on the fact that Best Buy has switched its business model 9 times during the pandemic. “We flipped to curbside pickup immediately, we’ve done appointments, and then in mid-June opened for shopping again…. Especially, we weren’t sure about how long we would be closed and what the demand would be in terms of what are considered more discretionary products…”
Best Buy, as other big box chains, include penalty clauses in their contracts with suppliers if a vendor ships fewer products than stipulated or fails to ship on time, said industry members. However, we were told by several vendors, that those clauses were not enforced by many of the big box stores including Best Buy during the pandemic.
Several industry members confirmed that Best Buy is short on car audio products including CarPlay and Android Auto head units and double DIN head units.
In her interview with the CTA, Barry summarized the current shift in consumer spending. “About a trillion of spend went to things like sporting events, movies, cruises, vacations and a miniscule part of that is being spent right now and it’s moving into other buckets, because of the way were are living our lives. And so, I just think the idea of what is discretionary and what is not will evolve over time because we are living our lives in a way that is completely unique to anything that has come before.”
She noted several permanent changes to business including retail, as a result of the pandemic:
Consumers will continue to want to shop how and when they want.
The speed at which businesses must change and adapt has accelerated and will continue to do so.
Work flexibility is going to stick. The days of everyone being in the office all the time to get their work done is over.
When asked about Black Friday this year, Barry said, to avoid crowded stores, retailers are stretching out their Black Friday events over a longer period. Black Friday will also be more digital in nature. “You see a number of retailers say it’s going to start earlier because you don’t want lots of people all packed together at some point, so you are going to think about how to stretch out amazing deals throughout the season, but still offer that really fun holiday spirit.”
By the way, Barry joined Best Buy in 1999 and worked her way up to CEO. She is the daughter of two self-employed artists and grew up traveling the world, as her parents sold their art along the way. “My parents worked all the time. There was no on and off switch,” she said, noting she learned their work ethic by example. Her parents also felt a great sense of purpose in their work. And so, said Barry, “It was important for me to have a purpose in my work.”
Best Buy has 125,000 employees.
