Calling the trends and concerns of retail industry almost similar across India and Europe, Michael Gerling, Managing Director, EHI Retail Institute, presented his talk on "Global new age trends in consumers' retail experience expectations and retail environments” on day two at In-Store Asia 2016 at Pragati Maidan, New Delhi.

In his session, Michael said that though there has been a lot of speculations around the future of brick-and-mortar retail, however no future can be predicted. Therefore, in order to be future-ready, brick-and-mortar needs to be careful and flexible when marketshare of online retail is growing in possibly all countries. "Amidst the classic championship fight between online and offline retail, there is still lot of expectations from brick-and-mortar retail. And that has been well-documented at Euroshop in 2014 that witnessed tremendous success record,” Gerling informed.
 
He went on giving a few examples of how retail experiences have been re-designed around the globe. "Brands are already trying elements like interactive try-ons with touchscreens, pop-up stores (where no merchandises can be bought physically), digitalization of the stores, Internet of things, robotics in their brick-and-mortar formats," Michael added.