Lynchburg Regional Business Alliance held a luncheon to discuss the future of business

LYNCHBURG, Va. (WDBJ) -The Lynchburg Regional Business Alliance held a luncheon Thursday to discuss the future of businesses and their online presences since the rise of COVID-19.

Leaders from Truist and Amplified also attended as sponsors, along with guest speaker Sarah Davis, the East Regional Sales Manager of Lee Enterprises.

Davis spoke about how COVID-19 changed the way consumers shop, while educating business owners on how reshaping their business models to an e-commerce approach could be beneficial.

“With the pandemic, the height of online shopping and everyone being stuck in their homes and Zooms, it really changed the interface. We are seeing about 30% less foot traffic going though retail stores in the last few years,” Davis said.

According to Oberlo.com, projections show e-commerce sales worldwide are expected to grow to $6.4 trillion by 2024.

“There’s glasses brands out there that you can order four or five frames they’ll send them to use in a map. Right? So, how’s that customer experience? How can you make it easy? That’s where the Amazons of the world have done well, because you just get online, you click one button shop, buy now it’s here tomorrow. So, for our local partners and our local businesses, that becomes hard for them. It’s hard to compete with the Jeff Bezos of the world. So, making that process a little bit more personalized, telling the story of why you’re different and better. And then making that easy for the customers are huge looking at e-commerce solutions as it makes sense to start moving your platform over. There are trillions of dollars are being spent on it. I mean, people don’t even go to grocery stores anymore,” said Davis.