LONE TREE — Stores that offer customers a unique experience are all the rage in the retail industry these days. It’s not just about what you buy, it’s how much you enjoy visiting the place where you buy it.
With that in mind, the experience offered by the 4,000-square-foot Amazon store that opens Thursday inside the Park Meadows mall is best described as the physical equivalent of walking into the Amazon.com homepage.
The first display table inside the door features a group of top-rated products that appear on many Amazon’s user’s online wish lists. They include Bob Woodward’s book about the Trump administration, “Fear,” and the card game Codenames.
Choices about the selection are based in part on sales figures, pre-orders and other data, but consumer preference plays a major role. It’s right in the store’s name. Amazon 4-star store sells items with an Amazon customer rating of four out of five stars or better, along with top sellers and items that are new and trending on the website.
“It’s something we’re really excited about because we think we’re bringing a new approach to building a store,” Cameron Janes, vice president of physical stores for Amazon 4-star said Wednesday. “We’re trying to create a store that is a direct reflection of our customers.”
There are even excerpts from online reviews posted below products on the shelves. Digital sales tags update prices in real time based on what an item is selling for online.
On the shopping center’s second floor, across from Macy’s, the store is just the second Amazon 4-star in the country, trailing one that opened in Manhattan’s SoHo neighborhood by a few weeks. Plenty more are likely. A Berkeley, Calif., location has already be announced.
The Denver-area store will have some things its New York sibling does not, such as a top-selling sports and outdoor items and a selection of the stuff selling best to Denver-area consumers online.
About one-third of the store is dedicated to electronics, including a testing station for Amazon’s own smart-home technology. The store also carries a selection of Amazon’s private labels, such as blankets from its Stone & Beam home goods brand.
Janes acknowledged that some shoppers like to touch, feel and try products before buying. Amazon 4-star isn’t about trying to tap into customers who are adverse to online shopping, he said, but about providing options.
“We’re agnostic,” he said of online versus in-person shopping. “Our goal is to help customers find products that they love.”
It’s not the e-commerce giant’s first push into the brick-and-mortar space. It operates 18 bookstores across the country. Last holiday season it opened a series of pop-up stands selling Amazon brand electronics, including one in the downtown Denver Whole Foods store. Three of those kiosks are still around in Denver, including one at Park Meadows. That’s sticking around even with the 4-star store open.
Park Meadows general manager Pamela Schenck Kelly said the shopping center has always prided itself on being cutting edge, welcoming Tesla and Microsoft stores early on.
Amazon also acquired natural grocery chain Whole Foods Market in 2017. Whole Foods has hundreds of locations across the U.S. and Canada.
Related Articles
- April 1, 2018
Is Southwest Plaza a poster child for the changing face of the American mall?
- August 30, 2018
Amazon putting finishing touches on new office building near Boulder’s Pearl Street Mall
- November 9, 2017
Amazon to open pop-up store at the opening of the Whole Foods Market near Union Station
For Jon Schallert, a Longmont-based retail consultant who counsels small business on how to make their stores experience-driven destinations, Amazon’s 4-star ramp up is a positive sign about the future of retail.
“In some ways, its encouraging because it shows that large companies are recognizing that brick and mortar isn’t going away,” he said.
