“Phygitalization”: The Transformation of a Traditional Sector

Using a timeline, this chapter will present the emblematic technological events that have led to the technological transformation of the retail sector. Over nearly two centuries, retail commerce has moved from the invention of the cash register to the transformative changes of Artificial Intelligence. The present analysis of this transformation is divided into the following periods: (a) the early period of initial technological applications in retail, until the introduction of the personal computer in the 1980s; (b) the 1990s, when the World Wide Web was created and the era of consumerism began; (c) the 2000s, with the rise of social networking media; (d) the platform era, with the expansion of biometric technologies and the increase in consumer data mining; and finally, (e) the Covid-19 crisis and the changes it brought to how and where we consume.