Switching between channels

The irresistible rise of e-commerce already seems like an age-old, never-ending, story. Sales through this channel are projected to grow to around USD 7.5 tln globally by 2026 and to USD 25 bln in Poland alone. As everyone knows, during the Covid-19 lockdown, e-commerce soared largely because it was the only form of retail still accessible. Michał Masztakowski, the head of retail at Cushman & Wakefield in Poland, puts it this way: “Shoppers never abandoned traditional retail and shopping centres. It was the pandemic that made it impossible for us to do our shopping in the way we were previously accustomed to. Every time the lockdowns were relaxed, it showed us how much we valued the experience of visiting a physical store – and this is a trend that we can still see today when looking at the footfall for retail parks and shopping centres. According to our data, the footfall for a single retail centre of either format rose on average by 463,000 shoppers in July and by a