Smart Cities Need To Get Smart About Local Food

by guest

30 mar 2016

Guest post by Dr. Robyn Metcalfe, Director of Food+City. The views expressed are are solely those of the author and do not reflect the views of Food+Tech Connect. 

At a time when Britain was eyeing Germany and Bismarck as potential threats to the balance of power in Europe,  a British writer known for books about fly fishing wrote in 1897, “War, Famine, and our Food Supply,” fraught with concern about England’s ability to feed itself. The author, Robert Bright Marston, was beside himself, calling attention to England’s reliance on Russia and America for wheat and corn. Noting how Napoleon’s army starved on the steppes of Leningrad, Marston wanted another flavor of protectionism — the construction of grain storage buildings that would enable England to live for three months if a war cut the country off from its main source of food supplies in Russia and the U.S. He wanted to buy time for British farmers to build local capacity to fill the missing imports from Russia and America. Marston knew food was critical to the health of their nations, both for social stability and to enable economic progress for all its citizens.

Anxiety and concern about the impact that wars have on cities’ food supplies continues today. New Orleans and New York City are keenly aware that disruptions — whether war, hurricanes or other breakdowns of the food supply chain — have received only improvised protections. Cities routinely talk about their three- to five-day food supply, not the luxurious three-month supply Marston was angling for. But whether or not a city needs enough food for three days, three months or three years —  is a question that deserves more attention by urban planners and food systems experts..

Syrians are happy to have three minutes to consume a hastily provided meal from the World Food Program. After five years of conflict in Syrian, the UN and the World Food Program were finally able to restore full rations to Syrians after a lack of funding in December 2014 stopped the delivery of food to refugees in Syria. While the media talks about casualties caused by weapons, little is said about deaths caused by famine and poison through the food systems in countries now at war. Few are aware of the destruction of livestock and cropland, or the contamination of soil and water, over the long duration of some modern conflicts.

The ripple effect of the disruptions caused by wars is difficult to imagine. The most obvious is the breakdown of the infrastructure, especially in the transportation of food. In Syria, even the perception of a disruption in the delivery of food causes an increase in black market activity, rising food prices and higher incidences of hoarding. Pita bread, animal fat and potatoes quickly disappear into personal storerooms, and Syrians freeze and dry food for longer-term storage. As it becomes more and more difficult to transport food to Syria, Syrians are looking for more localized food sources. As commodities like fuel and flour diminish, people worry about being able to produce flatbread, a simple yet essential element of their diet. With the potential breakdown of Syria’s government comes the loss of state control of bread prices and ingredient supplies.

While not as long term and uncertain as the Syrian crisis, natural disasters like Hurricane Sandy bring home how food supply disruptions can upset the stomach of an entire region. In the aftermath of the hurricane in 2012, gasoline was scarce, transportation broke down and food logistics professionals trucking in food from around the world struggled to keep New Yorkers supplied with pizza and bagels. New York wants more than three days of food to keep it afloat in the future — twelve months would be nice. But who decides, and how do we ensure at least enough food for a country to adapt and find new sources of sustenance, as Marston argued for?

We need food to enter the conversations of urban designers, especially those engaged in creating smart cities. After all, it was the journalist Alfred Henry Lewis, who said in 1906 that “the only barrier between us and anarchy is the last nine meals we’ve had.” 

China Tax on Overseas Purchases Set to Kick In

Move seen as an attempt to boost domestic products; could hurt e-commerce players

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Food delivery workers from Meituan, an E-commerce company, on March 1 prepare to deliver orders placed online from a center in Beijing. PHOTO: ASSOCIATED PRESS

March 31, 2016 11:44 a.m. ET

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China is tightening its grip on cross-border e-commerce, imposing a new tax system on overseas purchases that form a growing business catering to Chinese consumers with an appetite for foreign goods.

The changes, announced by the Finance Ministry last week, include raising the so-called parcel tax that is currently imposed on overseas retail products that e-commerce firms ship into China. On top of that, such goods sent directly to consumers will now be treated as imports and will be subject to tariffs and value-added and consumption taxes, whose rates vary depending on the type and value of goods.

The ministry said the changes, which become effective April 8, are intended to put foreign and domestic products on an equal footing. But industry analysts said the move seems designed to give a boost to “made-in-China” products and could dent a small, but growing market for foreign goods sold by Alibaba Group Holding Ltd., JD.com Inc. and other e-commerce players.

Those marketplaces feature nutritional supplements and food by brands such as Ocean Spray, as well as diapers and other baby and maternal products. They form a slice of the 5 trillion yuan ($773 billion) in sales by e-commerce firms in China last year, double the level of 2012, according to Beijing-based research firm Analysys International.

The new levies could dampen some demand, just as an increasing number of retailers world-wide are hoping to sell into China, says Charles Whiteman, senior vice president of client services for MotionPoint, a technology company that helps international retailers sync their e-commerce websites across languages and currencies.

“Increases in prices always have the effect of driving demand down,” but the effect will be “modest,” Mr. Whiteman said. “It probably won’t be too noticeable for branded products,” which consumers are willing to pay a premium for.

Chinese consumers have demonstrated a willingness to pay more for products such as cosmetics, infant formula and other baby products. Chinese e-commerce companies have said that such products form the vast majority of the imported products sold on their websites, because of product-safety concerns in China.

Alibaba and JD.com both said they expected robust demand from Chinese consumers for overseas products, especially high-quality ones, to continue, even with the changes in policy.

The changes in taxes come as the Chinese economy is slowing down and the deceleration is crimping tax revenues. Tax revenues grew 4.8% last year, compared with 7.8% in 2014. Beijing is looking for new sources of growth and revenue, and is trying to guide the economy to rely more on consumption and less on investment and industry. At the same time, Beijing is anxious to build up domestic businesses to provide jobs.

The boom in e-commerce has provided better-priced goods to consumers and created new delivery and other logistics jobs. To nurture the sector, the government since 2012 allowed e-commerce firms to pay just the parcel tax, and not other tariffs, when importing goods through customs in about a dozen cities, including Shanghai and Shenzhen.

The lower taxes have given e-commerce businesses an edge over ordinary importers in China and domestic companies that make similar products, the Finance Ministry said in announcing the tax changes.

“As consumption plays a bigger role in the economy, the government prefers to see outbound consumption flow back,” especially for medium- and high-end goods, said Tan Naixun, an analyst at research firm Analysys International.

Calculating the impact of the changes on merchandise is difficult given that different categories of goods carry different rates. A company that sells infant formula milk, for example, will pay nearly 12% more in taxes if the sale is under 500 yuan because previous exemptions don’t apply, according to Mr. Tan, the analyst.

Luxury goods like jewelry will see extra taxes between 9% and 17%, while some levies on personal-hygiene and cosmetic products could fall since the changes rescind the previous heavier parcel tax on those products.

New tariffs on overseas purchases are likely to do only so much for domestic Chinese companies. Inefficiencies, particularly in distribution, add to prices of local goods. As incomes have risen, Chinese consumers have grown more discerning on both price and quality.

Li Jinyu, a 36-year old who teaches English at a university in Beijing, said she wants to shop locally but finds products are often more expensive than overseas ones.

She said she paid a little over 600 yuan for a pair of boots from London through Amazon.com when they were on sale. The same pair of boots at a name-brand store in Beijing carried a price of 1,900 yuan, she said, so even with the new taxes, the online price is better.

“If I see good deals, I’d still rather buy overseas,” she said.

Amazon.com Inc., which launched what the company calls an “Amazon Global Store” for purchasing products from abroad in China in 2014, didn’t respond to requests for comment.

How Quickly Are Industries Adopting the Internet of Things? Kai Goerlich Science fiction writer William Gibson is credited with saying, ”The future is already here—it’s just not evenly distributed.” Such is the case with the Internet of Things (IoT).

How Quickly Are Industries Adopting the Internet of Things?

Kai Goerlich

Science fiction writer William Gibson is credited with saying, ”The future is already here—it’s just not evenly distributed.” Such is the case with the Internet of Things (IoT).

Digital business requires both data and the equipment to capture, store, manage, and analyze that data before enterprises can better inform their decisions, automate actions, and improve operations. IoT technology provides a way.

According to IDC, companies are ramping up their IoT investments rapidly, which can be seen in seven major industries with high levels of physical products or assets. Overall, the market research firm forecasts that IoT spending will increase 19% on average through 2018. Some industries, such as discrete manufacturing, have already invested significantly; others, such as healthcare, have spent less to date but are expected to expand quickly in the future.

Opportunities for Connection

The IoT is poised for rapid growth across a wide variety of industries that are connecting physical assets 
Download the infographic here.

The IoT Creates New Revenue Models

The Internet of Things represents a new course for automation and data-enabled decision making. Companies can use data collected from sensors on machines to create new business processes and revenue models.

It’s no wonder the numbers that researchers at Gartner cite—6.4 billion connected things in use in 2016, an increase of 30% over 2015—sound both large (billions, up 30%) and small at the same time (we’re just getting started). The future is being distributed unevenly, but it will reach just about everywhere, eventually.

Utilities

Utilities are still in the early stages of connecting their physical assets, a McKinsey Global Institute analysis finds. Deregulation and new market entrants are expected to prompt greater investments in the future. For example, smart metering systems and renewable energy sources, both growing activities in this industry, require IoT connections.

And to compete, utilities will need to invest in systems that monitor and analyze data from smart devices at homes and businesses, Tata Consultancy Services notes. IDC predicts that eventually this industry will see a high impact from its IoT investments because both utility companies and consumers have a stake in making energy production and use more efficient.

Healthcare

The industry as a whole has been slowed by regulatory and privacy concerns, Tata Consultancy Services research finds. But as healthcare providers install more equipment to connect medical devices to networks, they, too, will adopt more data-driven devices. Ultimately, IDC suggests that the IoT will have a high impact through monitoring applications and sensors that enable patients to manage their health and fitness.

Wholesale

The IoT promises to bring new capabilities to distributors, including new opportunities to sell goods through industrial vending machines and automated transportation systems. However, the industry as a whole has been what McKinsey Global Institute calls a medium-level player on
the road to digitization.

Discrete Manufacturing

Companies ranging from consumer goods makers to industrial manufacturers are applying IoT investments to monitor production and the flow of goods. Sensors enable predictive applications to schedule maintenance for jet engines, for example. And consumer goods makers are starting to experiment with marketing applications enabled by machine sensors and smartphones, Tata Consultancy Services notes.

Retail

As VDC Research Group points out, the drive to digitize business has been going on since well before 2013. Prices for RFID transponders have dipped over the past decade, which has enabled retailers to affix tags to goods, speeding up inventory tracking and shipments processing and reducing shrinkage, RFID Journal reports.

Logistics

Logistics firm DHL and networking vendor Cisco predict that there will be 50 billion connected devices by 2020, while making the point that this “represents only a tiny fraction of what could be connected—something on the order of 3% of all connectable things.” The resulting connectivity will reshape how decisions are made about the way goods are stored, monitored, serviced, and delivered. According to IDC, the IoT will have a high impact on the logistics industry because the benefits are clear and easy to measure.

Process Manufacturing

Companies in process industries have been heavy investors in technologies that make their assets more productive, including enterprise resource planning and supply chain management software. Leading players see the IoT as a way to extend the value of these investments. For example, Deloitte researchers note that oil and gas companies can wring more efficiency from resource processing and distribution by collecting and analyzing data from sensors and by monitoring equipment to reduce unplanned equipment outages.

Benchmark Study Show Both Sides See Opportunity for Improvement, but Vendors Think They are Better than Retailers at Collaboration March 30, 2016 Supply Chain Digest Editorial Staff

This month, one last data point from the recent Supply Chain Digest benchmark report on the state of supply chain relationships between retailers and their suppliers, on views related to supply chain collaboration. The full report, based on detailed survey results from 50 retailers and more than 200 manufacturers, is available here: The State of Retailer-Vendor Supply Chain Relationships 2016 Supply Chain Digest Says... "It's not us, it's the other guy," the message seems to be. How good do retailers and vendors believe they are at supply chain collaboration? As can be seen in the chart at the right, the majority of retailers place their collaborative skills as just average (55%). Thirty-nine percent considered themselves above average, and interestingly, no retailer placed itself as having "near the top" in terms of collaboration capabilities.  Meanwhile, vendors scored themselves as possessing higher collaboration skills than did retailers, with a combined 53% scoring themselves as either above average or near the top, with just 37% scoring themselves as average collaborators. Visit the Retail Vendor Performance Management home page to learn more and subscribe to the monthly newsletter. That naturally enough leads to the question of what the barriers are to improved collaboration between retailers and manufacturers. Below is also a chart that quantified what both sides saw as key obstacles, but neither retailers nor vendors think their own collaborative capabilities are a big issue, with average scores of 2.4 and 3.7 on a scale of 1 (low barrier) to 7 (high barrier) from retailers and vendors respectively. "It's not us, it's the other guy," the message seems to be. In fact, the lack of trading partner skills in collaboration was the top ranked barrier among vendors, while the top ranked retail barrier concerned challenges in how to share the gains from any collaboration. In general, retailers rated almost every barrier a full percentage point or more lower than vendors, for reasons that aren't clear, other than perhaps a somewhat more simplistic view of what collaboration means versus the vendor perspective.

Returning customers are far more valuable to online retailers than new customers

• Andrew Meola
   
 

• Mar. 30, 2016,

BI Intelligence

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New customers are certainly important to retailers, but returning customers should mean more.

A new report from Monetate reveals that the value of returning customers is greater across numerous product categories, and that value continues to grow every year.

Returning visitor transactions comprised 48% of all U.S. e-commerce sessions in the fourth quarter of 2015 and spent $2.7 billion, almost double what new shoppers spent in that time period.

New online shoppers are only half as likely as returning customers to place an item in their card at just a 7.6% rate, compared to 14.8% to existing shoppers (up from 13.6% in the same period one year earlier).

New visitors also have higher bounce rates, the act of leaving after visiting just one page (typically the homepage). Those shoppers leave 34.8% of the time compared to 24.4% for returning shoppers, though that number is up from 23.1% in the year-ago period.

Returning visitors also have a higher conversion rate at 4.5%, up slightly from 4.4% in Q4 2014. New visitors convert just 2.4% of the time, down from 2.5% in the year-ago quarter.

So returning customers are clearly important, but longevity is also crucial. The top quartile of worldwide e-commerce companies receive most of their revenue from repeat customers at the two-year mark, notes RJ Metrics. At three years, repeat customers represent more than 60% of revenues for those companies.

Online retailers, therefore, need to know who their customers are in order to hold onto them and reach those two-year and three-year milestones. And there are numerous ways to do that.

Cooper Smith, senior research analyst at BI Intelligence, Business Insider's premium research service, has compiled a detailed report on e-commerce demographics that breaks down U.S. online and mobile shoppers by gender, age, income, and education, and takes a look at what they're shopping for, and how their behaviors differ.

This is crucial information for retailers who need to know who their potential customers are online in order to market to them effectively.

Here are the surprising facts about men's e-commerce and mobile commerce habits:

• When it comes to e-commerce, men drive nearly as much overall spending online in the U.S. as women. The conventional wisdom is that women drive shopping trends, since they control up to 80% to 85% of household spending. However, In 2010, comScore estimated that women account for $6 out of every $10 spent online. In 2012, a Greenfield survey found that women account for 58% of online spending in the U.S.
• Men are more likely to make purchases on mobile devices. 22% of men made a purchase on their smartphones last year, compared to 18% of women. And 20% of men bought something on a tablet, while the percentage for women was 17%.
• Many men say they would like to shift all their spending online. 40% of American men aged 18 to 34 said they would "ideally buy everything online," compared to only 33% of women the same age. (See chart, above.)
• Men are avid users of online auction sites: 43% of men ages 18-34 say they typically shop on online auction sites like eBay, compared to only 31% of women the same age.
• Men are price-conscious: Men of all age groups are more likely to look for lower prices on their phones than women, and are more likely than women to buy things on their phone.
• Male teens are also more avid e-commerce shoppers than their female counterparts: Among teens, the proportion of males who report shopping online (86%) is ten percentage points higher than that for teen girls (76%). Also, a higher percentage of teen boys say they shop at general interest e-commerce sites like Amazon (34%) and eBay (8%) than is the case among teen girls, who prefer more specialized and fashion-conscious sites.

Hybrid Blimps Could Soon Take To The Skies

These aren’t your Hindenburg-style airships.

Hybrid Airship

 

[Photo: Lockheed Martin]

MICHAEL GROTHAUS 03.30.16 8:00 AM

Massive blimp airships could soon take to the skies again, reports the Wall Street Journal. However, these blimps are a long way from the Hindenburg, which famously caught fire in 1937. Today’s airships are designed are hybrids, that rely on both their internal gas and their aerodynamic design to get off the ground.

Currently new hybrid blimps are being designed by multiple companies including aeronautics giant Lockheed Martin. Their blimps are 280 feet long and can carry as much as 47,000 pounds of cargo. Though they fly at slow speeds for an aircraft—about 90 miles per hour tops—the ships have the advantage of remaining in the air for long periods of time. This makes them ideal vessels for transportation of cargo and also as surveyor ships for industries such as oil and gas.

Yet industry isn’t the only market for these modern-day blimps. Stephen McGlennan, CEO of Hybrid Air Vehicle, one hybrid blimp company, says the aircraft could find a niche in the tourism industry. "Tourism and leisure is pushing itself to the front," he told theJournal, noting that his company’s Airlander 10 blimp could be fitted with a gondola to carry as many as 48 passengers.

Besides oil and tourism, the Journal says that other possible uses for the 21st-century blimps could include military, surveillance, transportation of cargo, and telecommunications, where the blimps could be utilized to deliver ad hoc wireless Internet to disaster areas—kind of like Project Loon does.

As for those worried about a Hindenburg-type disaster, these modern blimps aren’t only different in design. The Hindenburg caught fire so easily because it used hydrogen gas. The new blimps use helium.

Talking to a Rising Supply Chain Star: Debbi Wan, Cisco

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Today, smart OEMs are attracting young talent directly out of college. Debbi Wan, strategic sourcing manager, Global Manufacturing Operations for Cisco Systems, knew early on that she wanted to work in the supply chain. Since then, she's been making a difference for her company.
Wan was one of the young professionals recognized in the 30 Under 30 Rising Supply Chain Stars recognition program, a jointly sponsored initiative of ThomasNet and Institute for Supply Management (ISM).
Wan earned a triple major that included supply chain, marketing, and sustainability. She started her supply chain career at Cisco as an analyst. Since then, she's gotten a reputation for out of the box thinking and solid follow through that makes the organization perform better. Just one example: Wan noticed the sourcing team was using offline documents for tracking, an inefficient practice that made collaboration difficult. After enhancing the spreadsheet, Wan wanted to do more. She leveraged a contact from a previous position to design and develop a robust web-based tool to solve the issue. Next, she led efforts to develop an efficient way to view sourcing analytics that gave greater visibility and improved collaboration, allowing for aggressive pricing on new products and substantial savings.
We talked to Wan about her experiences in the electronics supply chain, as well as for her advice on other young professionals who might want to enter the field.

EBN: Tell us a little about your role at Cisco. How do you see your job evolving over time? 
Wan: I work in the Partner and Sourcing Management team within Global Manufacturing Operations of the supply chain organization. Day to day, I am occupied with collaborating with key stakeholders in order to deliver value through management of the strategic sourcing lifecycle. Specifically, I manage the strategic sourcing management lifecycle, from overseeing the supplier evaluation and selection process to proposing, negotiating and executing strategic agreements with Cisco's global manufacturing partners. My goal is to make educated and data-driven sourcing decisions while communicating tradeoffs and influencing business decisions in alignment with our strategies. I also manage a database of all the new product introductions that our team is engaged on.
In the future, there will likely be a trend of digitization and automation. This will allow information will flow faster and be more connected and mobile, which will enable more transparency and visibility. Business processes will be more connected and efficiently managed and dispersed through technology. This shift will allow us to be more agile and make more intelligent decisions. It is impressive to be a part of this significant movement, and it definitely won't happen overnight. The transformation is under way now and will continue to change the way we work.
EBN: What advice would you give someone who is thinking about a career in the electronics supply chain?
Wan: Manufacturing of high-tech networking equipment is justifiably complex, but it is also exciting and enlightening. I would highly recommend a role in electronics supply chain – whether you're interested in technology, manufacturing, process improvement, managing relationships, there is something for everyone in this field. Be ready to embrace the intricacies of working in global, cross-functional and diverse teams. In addition, be prepared for projects that span different offices, cultures, languages, time zones, hemispheres and operational dynamics. I also find enjoyment in this field because of its cutting-edge, forward-thinking and multi-disciplinary nature.
I believe the electronics supply industry offers a meaningful and fulfilling career. My work life boils down to managing complex, ambiguous, multi-stakeholder projects. It is very satisfying from a professional and personal perspective. Logic tells me, if I didn't enjoy what I do, I would surely be burnt out and in a different industry by now. It is important to find projects that excite you and that will play off your strengths, while helping to build new skillsets and broaden your experiences. In general, work hard and it will not go unrecognized; new opportunities will come about.
EBN: What are the biggest challenges in terms of getting beyond old school attitudes and ways of doing things?
Wan: It is important to make it a priority to evaluate all angles of a situation or habits, seek opportunities to continuously improve and make yourself more effective. Realize the habits that are inefficient and fruitless. Always try to collect feedback from those around you – teammates, peers and your superiors. Make sure that you understand and align the team, organization, and company's vision and strategy. Be sure to build trusting relationships with the stronger members of the team so that they are comfortable with sharing their experiences and imparting wisdom.
Remember that any great performer started somewhere; be comfortable with sharing challenges and asking for help as needed. Be cognizant of any existing misconceptions of the younger generation, interpret their perceptions, and figure out an approach to change those misunderstandings. Younger workers bring energy, momentum and excitement – they are anxious to get things done, gain experience, make an impact, and succeed. They have the potential to do as well, if not better than, their peers, but it's important to use emotional intelligence to recognize your own and other people's emotions to guide your overall thinking and behavior.
EBN: What help and support have mentors offered you? What advice would you offer to electronics OEMs who want to be an employer of choice to the next generations of supply chain managers?
Wan: In general, when you're early in your career, you don't necessarily know which projects to take on or the end outcome of a project that is assigned. Mentors can help to provide guidance on the potential impact of a project, expose you to significant opportunities, or steer you toward prospects that are a better fit.
My advice to the electronics OEMs who want to be an employer of choice to the next generation of supply managers is to connect newcomers to a team that they would be successful at, in a role that they are energized by. It's also critical to connect the new employee with a high performer who has abundant knowledge to share, and will help the newbie focus to on his or her strengths. I strongly believe that the mentors chosen should be passionate about their work and the company; this will help to fuel or ignite enthusiasm of the next-generation employees.
EBN: What else would you like to say about supply chain as a career or your experiences?
Wan: The team you decide to join is very important. Realize that there are experienced people in every organization who have been there since the outset and are very talented with a lot to learn from. On the flip side, mismanagement and imperfections are a reality – be sure to do your research and ask the right questions. Avoid focusing on the things you can't change, and do something about the things you can change. Don't drown yourself in data and be left starving for knowledge, work smart, and always think about the bigger picture you're solving for.

Amazon Home Services expands to 30 cities in first year

By Daphne Howland | March 30, 2016

Dive Brief:

• A year after launching its Home Services business, which includes in-home help from housecleaning and plumbing crews to assembly of big-ticket items, Amazon has expanded the effort to more than 90% of the U.S., according to a company spokesperson.
• Amazon said Wednesday that it estimates the on-demand market for home services at some $400 billion to $800 billion, and that to meet such demand, it has added 500 new services, bringing the total to 1,200.
• Amazon Home Services competes with the likes of Home Depot and Best Buy and even Ron Johnson’s fledgling effort, Enjoy, as well as with crowd-sourced business directory Angie’s List.

Dive Insight:

Amazon Home Services has grown from four metro markets 12 months ago to 30 U.S. cities. The largest markets are Los Angeles, New York and Washington D.C. “It’s because of the density of the metro area,” said Amazon spokesperson Erika Takeuchi, according to reporting from a press release received by several news outlets.

Amazon’s Home Services unit is another classic example of how the e-retail giant rarely limits itself to retail and is willing to launch and quickly expand any effort in any consumer segment that the company believes it has the potential to disrupt.

"They are uncovering ways of making the purchase of almost any product easier and more cost effective than shopping in a traditional store," Robert W. Baird & Co. analyst Colin Sebastian told Bloomberg. "The barriers between consumers making large appliance and home purchases online are falling quickly, and the home-services integration with Amazon is a great example of that."

At this point, Amazon sells more than a million products that give shoppers in certain cities an option to request help with assembly and installation. And that is boosting sales, according to Amazon spokesperson Takeuchi. The most popular services requested are mounting flat-screen televisions to walls and assembling treadmills, she said.

The growth of Amazon Home Services means that rival retailers like Home Depot and Best Buy must continue to offer similar customer services in order to keep pace. Amazon’s move into the space could pose even more problems for competitors as more consumers realize that Amazon offers home services, according to Forrester Research analyst Sucharita Mulpuru, who notes that Amazon also is greatly helped by its reputation for great customer service. 

"Amazon should absolutely be well positioned to do well here, particularly since they’re putting the brand, which so many people trust, behind everything as a guarantee," Mulpuru told Bloomberg. "Local big boxes are the ones most likely to feel the impact of this long term, but for now I don’t think most people are even aware that Amazon even offers any of these end-to-end solutions."