Six COOL Stores for a HOT Summer
The spring and summer have brought a flurry of new store concepts, from established players, international newcomers and online stars. Check out the six below.
1. Blue Nile, Garden City, New York
Online diamond and fine jewelry retailer Blue Nile’s first brick-and-mortar outing is cool and inviting. Dubbed a “Webroom” by the company, the 325-sq.-ft. store features only several cases of product. But associates are equipped with tablets on which they can show customers Blue Nile's full selection of goods and help them in making a purchase.
Merchandise can be ordered and picked up at the store, which also provides free cleanings and repairs.
2. Boston Marathon RunBase, Boston
Adidas brings its innovative RunBase format to the States, with a store close to the finish line of the world’s most celebrated race. The 2,000-sq.-ft. Boston Marathon RunBase offers an immersive retail experience that celebrates the competition while also selling Adidas footwear and official marathon apparel and accessories.
Interactive screens show key moments in race history, and there is plenty of related memorabilia and photos on display. Adidas product is displayed in cases with transparent touch screens.
Visitors can even “run” the race (and try out footwear) on a treadmill that simulates every step of the 26.2-mile course, complete with corresponding visuals and terrain.
3. Flying Tiger, New York City
The Danish brand’s first-ever U.S. store is Scandinavian modern and charming — and guaranteed to make you smile.
The 5,000-sq.-ft. shop is chock-full of quirky products for the home and office, and everything in between. Some of the goods are silly and whimsical (elephant-shaped iPad covers, mugs adorned with mustaches) and some are functional (frames, socks), but nearly everything is affordable. Ninety percent of Flying Tiger’s products are less than $10!
4. Jins Eyewear, San Francisco
Japan’s largest eyewear brand by volume makes its U.S. debut with a 4,900-sq.-ft. space that features some 1,200 different styles of the company’s exclusive frames in a gallery-styled environment that blends nature with minimalism.
At the heart of the space is a futuristic-looking, conveyor-styled edging machine that churns out high-quality, aspheric lenses. Customers can watch the entire process, which takes about 30 minutes from start to finish.
5. Studio Xfinity, Chicago
Cable giant Comcast looks to upgrade its often-maligned service reputation with a futuristic-looking, hands-on store concept focused on the customer experience. Studio Xfinity customers can test drive new Xfinity products and services on the store’s 46 tablets and touch-screen demo surfaces, play custom-designed multi- and single-player games and engage with special content and programming in the media-rich entertainment space. They can also pay bills, and exchange and pick up new equipment.
In Studio Xfinity’s most notable feature, customers are provided with dedicated in-store service support from the moment they enter via a tablet-based, custom-designed app. The app, in test mode at the space, gives staffers access to customer information, from the services they have to troubleshooting histories.
6. Target Open House, Minneapolis
It doesn’t get much more modern than this — Target Open House is an experimental space dedicated to the idea of the “connected” or “smart” home.
Part retail space, part lab, and part meeting venue, Target Open House sells about 35 sensor-laden (smart) home devices. One side of the 3,500-sq.-ft. space has products mounted on custom-made interactive displays that activate when someone draws near. The other side is designed as a transparent, acrylic “house” with a series of vignettes, including a living room and a nursery, that demonstrate how multiple connected smart devices can seamlessly work together to create real-life solutions. But that’s not all: the Open House will also host regular tech talks, meet-ups, product launches and demos.