In my book, "Digilogue: How to Win the Digital Minds and Analogue Hearts of Tomorrow's Customers", I argue that the brands that will be successful in the future will be those who bring the offline and online worlds together. A fascinating example of this convergance of the physical and the digital is the interactive retail solutions technology company ShopWithMe.
ShopWithMe Retail Store from WithMe on Vimeo.
The idea behind this concept is to combine the best from bricks and mortar and online stores, and create customer experiences that are truly personal and distinctive.
"For the last 10 years we had to live in two different worlds. One traditional bricks and mortar retailers that can't figure out how to use technology, and the other ecommerce retailers that provide a great experience in the digital world but have no idea of how to provide that same experience in the physical world, and that's why I started ShopWithMe, to bring best of those two worlds together."
- Jonathan Jenkins, Founder & Founder WithMe
The store is filled with a lot of smart technology that can interact with the customers and provide them with valuable product information and recommendations in real-time. The Pixel Wall is one of those innovative solutions that ShopWithMe have been recognized for. The wall is consists of 900 individual screens that can move independently from each other and together form racks and shelves. Customers can interact with the wall via ShopWithMe's mobile app and get product suggestions and content from the brands in the store.
ShopWithMe's opened up an interactive retail store in Chicago last year in collaboration with shoe brand Toms Shoes and Raven + Lily. Levi's, Estée Lauder, Baracuta, Rains and Spiewak are a few among many other well known brands that ShopWithMe have partnered with. Their plan is to create a network of smart stores so that retail brands can quickly and temporarily expand their analogue presence in urban areas.
Check out these blog posts for more insights about the future of retail: