No one wants to hold inventory; no one wants to touch product.

At least in the investment community. Nordstrom's got the memo too. (They're not alone either). I think this has created a lot of opportunities for the few companies that want to be good at this. To see this trend playing out (i.e. premium being paid to "inventory flexibility" let's call it), listen to this gem buried in Daphne Howland's recent article about Nordstrom's.

"Rather, executives outlined a new approach to inventory management that shares more risk with vendors. The plan is reduce its traditional wholesale operation, which now provides 85% of its assortment, to provide 50%, by increasing drop-shipping and concessions and instituting a hybrid model with shared revenue and risk."

The site plans to become kind of a "super dropship" site (not a marketplace) - the big problem with that is that increases supply chain waste quite a bit because each parcel is coming from multiple vendors. This attitude of "not caring" about parcel waste is counter to prevailing sustainability currents I see in the market too, so there are opposing forces here.