University of Michigan Ross Application Essay #1 - Current Issue Anonymous

The rapidly evolving online economy touches virtually every aspect of our lives. We now turn to Yelp to choose a restaurant, Airbnb for a weekend getaway, Uber for a ride, and Amazon to purchase products. All across the nation, and more specifically within the Plymouth-Canton community, large warehouse stores such as Sears, Macy’s, and KMart are going out of business. This is due to the increasing demand in the online marketplace where consumers can acquire goods for cheaper prices. Selling goods and services online is beneficial for both consumers and producers. Consumers can easily and effectively order goods to their home by the click of a button; and with websites like Amazon, they can have nearly any product at their doorstep within 48 hours of its purchase all without leaving their house. Merchants can conveniently list their products online that are accessible by people all over the globe and reach a greater customer base than they would by putting their products in brick-and-mortar stores. The big problem with this transition toward an online economy is that it’s forcing people into unemployment and leaving empty warehouses in nearly every U.S. city.

My proposal to solving this issue is to convert these abandoned...