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1、大学英语六级分类模拟题157 Reading Comprehension Shopping and the Internet, Making It Clic k A. Terry Lundgren and Kevin Ryan know and like each other. But when it comes to the future of retailing the boss of Macys, an American department-store giant, and the chief executive of Gilt Groupe, an online retailer,
2、disagree wildly. Mr. Lundgren remains a firm believer in an empire of bricks and mortar (实体店 ). Mr. Ryan is betting big on online-only selling. B. It used to be mail-order catalogues killing physical stores, then it was TV shopping and now it is online retail, says Mr. Lundgren. Although he will not
3、 be pinned down on whether the Internet is a threat to shopkeepers or an opportunity for them, he is convinced that his chain is on the right path. Macys is embracing omnichannel integration, that is, selling stuff on television, through mail-order catalogues and online, as well as keeping its depar
4、tment stores. The company runs 810 shops across America under the mid-price, mid-market Macys brand and 38 more luxurious Bloomingdales outlets. Mr. Ryan argues that bricks-and-mortar shops are gravely threatened by Amazon and other online-only retailers, and says he can see no evidence that there a
5、re big opportunities for traditional retailers in online retail. C. Overall, retail sales in America are pretty flat, so the double-digit growth of online sellers is coming at the expense of physical shops. Amazons sales in the past year were $48 billion, compared with Macys $26 billion. Last year o
6、nline sales in America reached $188 billion, about 8% of total retail sales. They are forecast to reach $270 billion by 2015. So far, Mr. Lundgren has good reason not to worry that the sky is falling. Most relevant for Mr. Lundgrens debate with his friendly rival, online sales from the websites of M
7、acys and Bloomingdales jumped by 40%. This reflects Macys efforts to expand its online business. It is building a new logistics (物流) center for online sales in West Virginia and expanding an existing one in Tennessee. And it is fixing a glaring flaw in its Internet-sales operation: until now online
8、shoppers have only been able to buy goods in Macys warehouses; soon they will be able to order items from the stock of its stores. Magic mirrors and Facebook friends D. Mr. Lundgren is keen to continue experimenting with ways to use the Internet. In 2010 Macys introduced a virtual fitting room where
9、 customers tried on digital representations of clothes through their reflection in a magic mirror and shared them with their friends on Facebook. It didnt work, admits Mr. Lundgren. So Macys is now trying out virtual models. With its thriving Internet business, Macys is ahead of many other retailers
10、. E. Walmart, the worlds biggest, waited for a long time and hesitated over its online strategy until it finally decided to make winning of e-commerce a key priority, as Mike Duke, its chief executive, puts it. Like an increasing number of store chains, Walmart is inviting online shoppers to pick up
11、 their purchases from its physical stores if that suits them. Since last June they have been able to do so on the day they place their order. Now, says Joel Anderson, who runs the companys online business, more than half of Internet orders are collected from stores. The company claims this is saving
12、 shoppers millions of dollars in delivery charges. In spite of these recent improvements, Walmart is not yet reaping big profits from its online business. It does not break out its Internet sales from the total, but they are still tiny for its size. F. There are some retailers, in particular those a
13、t the extremes of the market, that can safely ignore the threat from shoppers migration to the Internet. At the luxury end, Yves Saint Laurent is unlikely to start selling its ball gowns over the net; at the cost-conscious end, dollar stores will continue piling it high and selling it cheap. But the
14、 vast majority of retailers in between may have little choice but to counter the rise of online-only rivals by creating strong Internet operations of their own. The biggest threat to most of them is Amazon, the undisputed champion of online selling. Other online-only retailers have little chance of
15、felling this giant. Their best bet is to be distinctive. G. Mr. Ryans Gilt Groupe is modeled on Frances Vente Prive, an online shopping club for expensive branded stuff at reduced prices. The customers average age for Mr. Ryans business is 34. Consumers aged 24 to 35 already do about a quarter of th
16、eir shopping online, says John Deighton of Harvard Business School. In Mr. Deightons view the Internet-retail revolution is over, in that online buying is well established and will only keep growing. However, he says it is unclear how important a sales tool social networks like Facebook and Twitter, to which some online retailers are pinning their hopes, will turn out to be. H. Some bricks-and-mortar retailers have already had disappointing experiences trying to sell through social media. Over t
