2020…what a mind-boggling year for retail! With a lot of this year’s news and headlines having focused on depressed sales, supply chain challenges, and the collapse of Goliaths such as Debenhams and the Arcadia Group, you’d be forgiven for thinking that this year has been an end-to-end disaster for creative product businesses.

However, research shows that a huge number of small and independent businesses have had a good, if not great 2020, thanks to changing trends, evolving technology, and consumer attitudes that in part have been accelerated by the pandemic.

In episode 22 of The Resilient Retail Game Plan, I’ll review the ups and downs of 2020 and how they each inform my predictions for 2021. We’ll look at how large scale supply chains struggled under shifts in spending whilst small businesses were able to pivot and adapt, and how continued growth in online purchasing hasn’t negated the increases we’ve seen in people shopping locally. I’ll also discuss how the improvements in tech are continually lowering the barrier for entry for small businesses to get up and running and how connecting to your customers through personalization and conscious consumer choices should be at the heart of your creative product offerings.