Flutterby™! : Killing retail

HP has ramped up their efforts to get me to buy my ink directly from them. I've been involved in the back room chatter about consumer products sales occasionally, so my first reaction was a bit of an eyebrow raise: They're offering me a discount from what I'd pay at the retail level. This means they're confident enough in their market strength that they're willing to piss off Staples et al.

So in light of my recent musings on transportation, what does this mean? A few guesses:

• Local sales tax revenue is toast. Maybe a bit of an overstatement, but given that everything's being shipped from China anyway, there'll be few reasons to buy from a local vendor.
• The real efficiency gains in transportation will be gotten from bringing the products to the consumer rather than bringing the consumer to the products. Why run buses through a neighborhood every half hour when you can run one delivery truck once a day?
• Shopping will fall to the virtual presence before commuting does.