If the Bon Appรฉtit pop-up was a way for the food-loving public to sample fare from high-end chefs, then Wired magazine's six-week store is the place for the tech-adoring consumer to ogle new gadgets. Now in its third year, the magazine's retail showroom in SoHo puts advertisers front and center, enabling its readers and other holiday shoppers to browse and test-drive new technology from manufacturers including Canon, Palm, and Nintendo. Planned by the magazine and designed by Tronic Studio, the pop-up opened on Friday, November 16, and will run through December 30.
The new Greene Street locationโthe store was previously housed on Wooster Streetโhas an extra 1,000 square feet of space, which the team at Wired filled with a wider selection of products. "Our strategy has been consistent.... [The store] has well over 100 products this year, so the production selection has grown and the diversity of the products has grown. It's deeper and broader than before," explained Jim Richardson, Wired's associate publisher of marketing. Prices also run the gamut, with some gadgets under $100 as well as more expensive devices like the $13,450 water bobsleigh. For convenience, a new addition this year is a Web site that allows shoppers to buy the featured items online.Along with the display of high-tech products, the Condรฉ Nast-owned publication brought back a schedule of weekly events ranging from live musical performances to afternoon tea. Of these, the most interactive is the Sunday-afternoon scavenger hunts, where store employees hand over new Palm Centro smart-phones to consumers and send them into the streets to scout a location using Google Maps and the device's camera function. To avoid community complaints, the magazine keeps the programming within retail hours, consistent with the stores in the area.
For the first time this year, the promotion also moved beyond its East Coast locale with kiosksโmini versions of the storeโat W Hotels in California. Starting with the San Francisco property on Tuesday, November 27, the pop-ups will be open 24 hours a day and run for 10 days at hotels in Los Angeles, San Diego, and Silicon Valley. The pop-ups are aimed at reaching a wider audience: Wired hopes to target other demographics (such as business travelers) with this extension of the event.
The new Greene Street locationโthe store was previously housed on Wooster Streetโhas an extra 1,000 square feet of space, which the team at Wired filled with a wider selection of products. "Our strategy has been consistent.... [The store] has well over 100 products this year, so the production selection has grown and the diversity of the products has grown. It's deeper and broader than before," explained Jim Richardson, Wired's associate publisher of marketing. Prices also run the gamut, with some gadgets under $100 as well as more expensive devices like the $13,450 water bobsleigh. For convenience, a new addition this year is a Web site that allows shoppers to buy the featured items online.Along with the display of high-tech products, the Condรฉ Nast-owned publication brought back a schedule of weekly events ranging from live musical performances to afternoon tea. Of these, the most interactive is the Sunday-afternoon scavenger hunts, where store employees hand over new Palm Centro smart-phones to consumers and send them into the streets to scout a location using Google Maps and the device's camera function. To avoid community complaints, the magazine keeps the programming within retail hours, consistent with the stores in the area.
For the first time this year, the promotion also moved beyond its East Coast locale with kiosksโmini versions of the storeโat W Hotels in California. Starting with the San Francisco property on Tuesday, November 27, the pop-ups will be open 24 hours a day and run for 10 days at hotels in Los Angeles, San Diego, and Silicon Valley. The pop-ups are aimed at reaching a wider audience: Wired hopes to target other demographics (such as business travelers) with this extension of the event.
Photo: BizBash
Photo: BizBash
Photo: BizBash
Photo: BizBash
Photo: BizBash
Photo: BizBash
Photo: Louis Seigal/Louis Seigal Photography
Photo: BizBash
Photo: BizBash
Photo: Drew Altizer Photography