Shopify’s uninspired vision of the future of shopping

While it began with a simple tool for sellers to set up their own e-commerce stores, Shopify has expanded into a platform with a thriving ecosystem of plug-ins. In addition, it allows merchants to manage and process payments, and recently launched fulfillment services and e-mail marketing software. Shopify is quickly building all the same functiona... See more

When we look back over the past 100 years, traditional commerce (and the culture it indirectly endorsed) was primarily curated by a single person’s point-of-view. Even when commerce moved online, to places like Amazon or Farfetch, retailers still controlled the types of things consumers purchased. Online commerce didn’t innovate a new shopping expe... See more

As I’ve previously discussed, the importance of individual brands diminish on aggregator e-commerce platforms. It’s challenging to build a strong brand on Amazon because Amazon itself is the brand that consumers trust, and brands become secondary to signals like reviews and sort order. The antidote for brands is to leverage platforms that allow for... See more