80% of Harvey Norman goods are going online, a fed up Gerry Harvey confirmed today.
 Click to enlarge |
| Image: Gerry Harvey gets set to join the online race. |
“Eighty percent of our retail products will be online in September,” Harvey Norman’s chairman confirmed to Computerworld.
“I’m sick of talking about online [retail] to journalists.” Well talked about it, he certainly has.
Harvey and his high street stalwarts, including the likes of Myer and Solomon Lew’s Just Group kicked up a stink last year when, en bande, demanded the introduction of 10% GST tax on all goods sold online under the value of $1000, claiming online was destroying its brick and mortar retail businesses. (I wonder is Harvey as keen on this tax now he is venturing into the competitive online world of trading).
Harvey was one of the main champions of the tax until the proposals went sour after major consumer backlash.
Well the Productivity Commission, charged by the Gillard government to investigate if Gerry Harvey et al had a case, certainly don’t seem to think so.
“Other factors such as much lower prices, greater range of products-that is, choice- and convenience available online appear to be far more important drivers,” for web business, the Productivity commission said in a recent draft report on the retail sector. The final report is due out soon.
Even as far back as 1997 the same Gerry Harvey famously uttered: “No one will ever make money selling online,” when the Internet was first emerging as a sales platform.
This denial strategy was carried on until earlier this year, when Harvey Norman turned to social networks like Twitter, Facebook and even its own deal-a-day website flgging everything from cosmetics to camping gear in the hope of reinvigorating dull profit growth.
Currently, customers cannot purchase good on harveynorman.com.au – the site acts as an information point only – allowing users create wish lists, but that’s all.
Earlier this week, SmartHouse reported on how Harvey Norman operation is in hot water, with mass sackings in its Clive Peters and Rick Hart retail operations due to underperformance.
