I don't know if the economics of this make sense but it's always seemed to me that the logical end goal of this is that brick and mortar stores should refocus as marketing arms of manufacturers. That is, they should price goods basically at cost such that they're economically indifferent to whether a sale is made or not but charge manufacturers a significant sum for shelf space and promotion.

Lots of goods genuinely do require an in person experience to evaluate whether to buy but can be had cheaper online. What ends up happening is that people go to the stores to handle the goods & chat with the salespeople, then later buy online. In effect, B&M stores have been giving a huge, inadvertent subsidy to online stores the entire time and I can't help but imagine that's what's really crippled their businesses.

I think perfumes will be one of the early indicators of how these new business models will play out. The entirety of the experience of a perfume is how it smells and that's something impossible to convey online. At the same time, all perfumes of the same brand are guaranteed to be chemically identical and shipping costs are a minor part of total costs so it's perfect as an online good.