Amazon is reportedly planning to open a chain of larger retail outlets similar to department stores that will sell everything from household goods to clothing.
The Seattle-based e-commerce giant is expanding into larger retail locations of about 30,000 square feet, aiming to create one-stop-shopping destinations where it will likely showcase its private label brands, according to a Wall Street Journal report.
The first stores will likely be in Ohio and California, according to the report, adding that the timing of the their opening and specific details about them, including which spaces they might be taking over, was not immediately clear.
Most department stores are three times the size of the proposed Amazon stores.
Amazon already operates 500 Whole Foods stores nationwide after acquiring the chain in 2017, as well as some 20 bookstores and two dozen Amazon 4-Star stores, which showcase popular gadgets, books and household items including kitchenware. Amazon has also been shopping for locations for its Amazon Fresh grocery stores, one of which is in a former Fairway Market store in Paramus, NJ.
With so many vacant bricks and mortar spaces vacant thanks to the pandemic, the online giant has plenty of options.
Amazon executives have long sought insight into consumers’ shopping habits in physical stores and are likely looking to better showcase their own products to shoppers who otherwise might not have tried them, The Journal said, citing a person familiar with the plan.
Amazon did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
