SAN DIEGO, California (NBC) -- The way you shop is changing.
It's not enough to go from store to store.
Now you need to consult your smart phone.
A Pew Research study shows that a quarter of all shoppers say they used their smart phone to look up product reviews while they were in the store and even went so far as to use their phones to compare prices at other locations this holiday season.
"That's one fact. The more powerful fact is about 14 percent of them then say they leave the retail shop and buy it online," adds San Diego State marketing professor Steven Osinski.
Osinski says bargain shoppers look for any advantage and their smart phones offer an additional retail experience squeezed onto a tiny screen.
"Price, but they're also utilizing it for reviews, evaluations, follow-up customer service issues," he notes.
The growing use of smart phones is a great deal for consumers looking for bargains, but not so good for some stores.
Of those people who used their smart phones in the store, 35 percent bought the product, 19 percent decided to buy the product online, and eight percent bought the product at another store.
Osinski says retail stores are losing billions of dollars in sales because of smart phone shopping, but he says it's not going away and retailers need to make changes.
