Who needs stores anymore? Kate Spade turns window shopping into actual shopping. The future is now.
So I’m walking down W 18th street and I see this guy standing in front of a bright yellow storefront rubbing the window like it was some kind of oversized iPad or something.
And when I got a bit closer, I realized that was exactly what he was doing. The entire window had been transformed into a giant display with a 5 foot tall framed area where you can swipe your way to a new wardrobe, pay for it, and have it delivered to your (Manhattan, I’m assuming) location in one hour.
Turns out Kate Spade has partnered up with eBay and put their new capsule collection (called Saturday) up for sale at 4 electronic kiosk/pop-up shops around the city. So from now through 7 July, you can drunkenly stumble down Orchard Street, impulse buy some flowered sunglasses you don’t need, and the $$ will be gone from your bank account in the time it takes to wipe your hand across a window.
Great and kind of big brother/horrible at the same time. The technology is really cool and very attractive, but there is something unsettling about the absolute lack of human contact here. Are stores going to be a thing of the past soon? Like the helpful people at ticket windows in the subway are quickly becoming?
Cool!