Tuesday, February 22, 2011

iPads Upgrade the Shopping Experience

Keeping up with technology trends is important. For retailers, that means recognizing that their customers may prefer being able to customize products or browse their options online before making an in-store purchase. Many retailers are making efforts to accommodate their technology-savvy shoppers by incorporating iPads into their stores.

An article from the Chicago Tribune discusses some of the ways stores are using iPads to upgrade their customers' shopping experiences. One cosmetic company, Make Up For Ever, is using iPads to allow customers to access face charts for browsing makeup combinations. Things Remembered, a personalized gift retailer, is using iPads to allow customers to browse messages and designs for engravings. The stores plan to eventually add a feature allowing customers to view their completed design before they order. Other clothing stores are using iPads to allow customers to browse their online catalogs while shopping in their stores.

How much the addition of iPads to stores improves the shopping experience is something to be experimented with and debated, but making the in-store shopping experience more high-tech will likely appeal to the wired generations.

Would you be impressed by iPads when shopping in stores? Have you been to any of the stores already using them?

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