In yet another foray into the brick and mortar world, Amazon will open a general merchandise store in New York City Thursday, offering mostly new and trending items on the company’s website, all of which have four or five star reviews.
Perhaps more importantly, the store will also sell Amazon devices that run its smart assistant Alexa, as well as accessories that work with Alexa.
The store is located in New York's SoHo district. Items will feature two prices, the list price for regular buyers and the Amazon.com online price for those with Amazon Prime accounts.
The store joins Amazon's two other physical stores in New York City, both bookstores. One is near the Empire State Building and the other is by Columbus Circle.
The Amazon 4-Star store is different in that it will sell consumer electronics, kitchen, home, toys, books, and games, among other items.
To leverage Amazon's deep knowledge of what Americans want, peppered throughout the store will be “Most-Wished-For” displays showing collections of products that are most frequently added to Amazon.com Wish Lists. There will also be a "Trending Around NYC” section.
The store joins Amazon's 17 bookstores nationwide, four Amazon Go cashier-free convenience stores, two Amazon Fresh grocery pickup and store sites, dozens of Amazon Pop-Up stores in malls and more than 470 Whole Foods grocery stores.
Each offers Amazon a way to introduce a non-online audience to its offerings and to give even its customers a chance to experience Alexa and the constantly multiplying array of devices the digital assistant is available on.
With voice-command believed to be an important part of the future of online sales, Amazon is pushing hard to get customers into its eco-system early in the hopes that they'll stay true to Alexa as the technology develops.
