Om Malik on Amazon Opening a Retail Store

Om Malik:

The Seattle Times reveals that the 7,500 square foot store will feature books that based on Amazon.com data. “We’re taking the data we have and we’re creating physical places with it,” Jennifer Cast, VP of Amazon Books told The Seattle Times. “We’re completely focused on this bookstore. We hope this is not our only one. But we’ll see.”

However, it is towards the end of the press release accompanying the news that Cast tips her hand and why I believe why this is one of the many stores to come. “At Amazon Books, you can also test drive Amazon’s devices. Products across our Kindle, Echo, Fire TV, and Fire Tablet series are available for you to explore, and Amazon device experts will be on hand to answer questions and to show the products in action.” she writes.

The growing arsenal of devices, intelligence derived from data, and desperate need to create physical experiences around books were my three reasons why I had predicted in June 2010 that Amazon will eventually have to open physical locations.

Good call by Om.

The fact that they’re all-in on Fire TV — refusing to sell Apple TV or Chromecast, and (apparently) refusing to build a Prime app for Apple TV — shows that they’re serious about getting people to buy their devices.

★ Thursday, 12 November 2015