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To: donkeyman who wrote (3455)	12/11/1998 9:15:00 AM
From: Sili Investor	Respond to of 37507

<<<Canadian retailers have been slow to react to the on-line trends">>> Here's a small article in the National Post today I think we will be saying to ourselves in five years - "Poor Zellers, they really missed the boat!!" Zellers President says high-flying e-commerce forecasts a tad overblown It's going to ve at least five years before Canadian companies will be offering a complete menu of online shopping, predicts George Heller, president of Zellers, Inc., the discount retailing unit of Hudson's Bay Co. While online shopping has already taken off in the United States, its introduction is slower in Canada and the product selection is slimmer. "I don't think that by the year 2000 we will be substantially further ahead then we are now. Canadians are typically less likely to shop by catalogue than Americans and are also more concerned with the security aspects of giving their credit card over the Internet. We are approaching e-commerce very slowly. It's not something we want to jump into. At the end of the day there's alot of talk about the volume on the Internet but, when you rule out books, CDs and pornography, it's really not that much. It's not going to be a big bang". And books are a big hit for companies like Amazon.com because "a book is a book is a book". Mr. Heller points out "Shopping is an emotional thing. You need to be stimulated by what you see. Without seeing or feeling, it's hard to buy". Zellers plans to ease into e-commerce by getting its customers used to catalogue shopping first. The chain will focus on highly recognizable items, such as brand-name toys, in their catalogue and eventually in online shopping because those are things customers are familiar with and don't need to see in order to buy. Mr. Heller believes forecasts about the popularity of high-tech shopping are overrated. "It changes quickly and it doesn't change at all." Instead, Zellers is focusing on making shopping a more pleasant experience for its customers by offering higher end merchandise and improving the physical appearance of the stores. "We want to go at the same pace our customers want to go. We don't try and change their religion to sell them a Bible. People trust bricks and mortar." Suzanne Steel, Financial Post