In addition to its smart supermarkets, Amazon now wants to launch special fashion stores that combine the analog shopping experience with convenient digital shopping. The “Amazon Style Stores” are scheduled to open their doors this year.
Online shopping with touch?
The basic idea sounds as simple as it is ingenious. In its Style Stores, online mail-order giant Amazon wants to revolutionize the way people buy new clothes. In doing so, it is quite obviously the concern of the group to combine the advantages of classic shopping excursions with those of convenient online shopping. The first images are reminiscent of classic clothing stores, at least in their basic concept.
Here hangs a jacket, there are several pairs of shoes. What you like, you should be able to try on at will and then also buy. However, the surrounding area is to become much smarter. Cornerstones such as a smart app connection, touchscreen-based control units and a sophisticated algorithm will ensure this.
Tying in with “Amazon Go Stores”
Amazon has already demonstrated how well the mixture of classic and modern can work with its Go Stores. In those, you can shop for groceries quite conveniently, just like in retail stores. The big difference, however, is that the stores manage without cash registers. You simply pay as if you were shopping on the online retailer’s website. This success story is now to be continued with the Style Stores. In a direct comparison, however, Amazon’s smart clothing stores come up with even more exciting technology than the grocery stores already do.
Smartphone as shopping companion
As with the Go Stores, you should always have your smartphone in your hands at the Amazon Style Store. By means of a suitable app, you can get more detailed information on each individual product at the respective shelves. A simple QR code scan is all it takes. In addition to the available designs (sizes, colors, etc.), you should also be able to see the reviews of buyers. Should you be interested in a piece, you don’t have to carry it around with you at all. Instead, you simply mark it in the app. As you shop, a shopping cart accumulates, which you can then have sent to a fitting room. And this is where Amazon’s smart algorithm kicks in.
In addition to the items of clothing you have selected, it also selects matching items. But it’s not just the shopping advice provided by the algorithm that’s an advantage. You no longer have to walk around with a mountain full of clothes. Once you arrive in the changing room, you are supposed to stand in front of a huge display that can be controlled via touchscreen. If a piece doesn’t fit you, you can easily have another size or color sent to you. Alternatively, you can have a completely different item of clothing sent to the changing room. If you have found what you are looking for on your shopping trip, you can then decide how to buy the items you have found. Either one strikes directly in the style store or one saves them in his personal Amazon shopping cart and orders them online at a later time.
For the sake of the environment?
But it should not only be possible to order items reserved in the store later online and have them delivered to your home. Amazon also wants to make the reverse possible. Who likes garments online, he should be able to have them sent to his style store. This has various advantages for the buyer, Amazon but certainly also the environment. So you can try on a piece of clothing before buying again to really make sure that it is the right one.
In turn, Amazon itself doesn’t need too much merchandise space for its style stores – unlike traditional stores. The bottom line is that the company can use the space it gains as an extension of its retail space. Last but not least, the ecological aspects should not be ignored. Amazon has set itself the goal of operating in a climate-neutral manner by the year 2040 and thus without emitting harmful CO² gases. If many customers use the option of having clothing delivered to the Amazon Style Store and not to their homes, this should save many courier trips including delivery and return.
