The role of the retailer

The retailer is the last link in the chain of distribution between the manufacturer and the ultimate consumer. When people speak of middlemen, they mostly think of the retail store because this is the business establishment most consumers know best. They know their favorite department store, grocery store, drugstore, hardware store, clothing store and candy store.
Without retail stores to make the goods of industry conveniently available to millions of consumers, there could be no mass production. The country would never have experienced an industrial revolution. The retail shop is one of the oldest and most universally-used business establishments not only in the United States and Canada but the world over.
The function of the retail store is to bring the correct assortment of goods for consumers to use, and to make them available in the most economical and convenient form. The only reason for retail establishments is that household consumers need to purchase frequently, in small amounts, a variety of things needed in the home: food, clothing, gasoline, hardware, drugs, and many other items that enter into the daily lives of the people.
The development of large-scale retailing has been a phenomenon of the twentieth century. Even department stores, many of which have become giants in their own right, were a development of the early 1900's. Postal service aided the growth of retail mail order houses, which in turn evolved into the present-day syndicate stores such as the great retail chain establishments of Sears, Roebuck and Company, and Montgomery Ward. Changing consumer habits and buying patterns favored the growth of large retail establishments, especially for shopping goods. Consumers found convenience in the "one-stop" shopping facilities of the modern department store.
From this, it was inevitable that giant convenience goods stores should also develop. The supermarket, a product of the early days of the depression and the need for lowering the price of necessities, has today become the most successful single type of large-scale retail merchandising. The shopping center, outgrowth of the movement of population to the suburbs, and of vastly increased mobility because of improved transportation facilities, has truly made one-stop shopping possible.
Shopping centers require a large volume of business. This makes for bigness, and the big independents and chain stores are mushrooming everywhere. The reason, again, is consumer convenience and consumer service at low cost.