Today the internet brought reports that the online retail giant Amazon is planning to open physical retail stores in the US. The news is unconfirmed so far, but sources say they would focus on small boutique stores with products like Kindle as well as titles that have been published by Amazon.
To me, the move doesn't really make sense, at least in the way it's been presented so far, and I can't see the stores being that popular. (Although a customer service center, where you can bring your broken or malfunctioning Kindle and exchange it for a new one immediately sounds amazing. Amazon is great with returns on the Kindle, but you still have to call or email customer service and wait for shipping and all that.) From the sounds of it, Amazon would start with opening stores in the US, but if they came to Canada, would you shop there? Virtually everything I've bought at Amazon.ca in the last few years has arrived the next day. And since I don't have a car, that's a whole lot easier than schlepping to the mall and back.
It's worth noting that there was a rumour at the end of 2009 that Amazon was planning on opening physical stores in the UK -- and that, of course, was false.
