Online tech meets offline shopping at retail's big show

This story was delivered to BI Intelligence "E-Commerce Briefing" subscribers hours before appearing on Business Insider. At the National Retail Federation's (NRF) annual Big Show, BI Intelligence analysts in attendance learned that prominent retailers and their technology partners — including Neiman Marcus, Intel, and Alibaba — are focused on how to bring the best of online shopping to offline retail. For context, e-commerce payments volume was estimated by BI Intelligence to have surged 18% to hit $461 billion in 2017, while offline retail merely inched ahead an estimated 1% to $4,486 billion in the same period — a primary factor behind continuing store closures.