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Samsung unveiled its first O2O (online-to-offline) store, located at Jio World Plaza, Bandra Kurla Plaza, Mumbai on Tuesday. The Samsung BKC store acts as the epicentre for the company to showcase its latest product and innovations including the latest AI-powered Galaxy S24 series. This is just the beginning, the brand has some grand plans for Indian consumers.
Samsung has 11 premium experience centres across India. In an exclusive interaction with Indianexpress.com, Sumit Valia, Senior Director of D2C Business at Samsung said that the brand has plans to add four more such stores by February.
The latest BKC store is one of a kind that showcases premium products, and the flagship store comes to India just a few months after Apple unveiled its own store in Mumbai, which is also in BKC. Consumers can order a product online and get it collected in two hours from the store, combining the best of online and offline shopping experiences. Interestingly, this is something that Apple has been offering for years.
According to the company, the main objective of the offline store is to enrich the customer’s experience by giving them more options and information to enhance their overall shopping experience. The main theme of the store is AI and Samsung is only showcasing its top-of-the-line products.
“Two types of people come into the stores — people who want assistance, who will ask questions and experience the products, and people who want to discover the product on their own. With the Samsung BKC store, we are aiding that journey with the store’s best-in-class executives helping users understand the product better – and there are also QR codes across the store where users can do a simple scan and get to know about products on their own,” Valia said.
Samsung BKC is also the company’s first store with a digital catalogue, which offers over 1,200 products, including offerings that aren’t showcased at the store. The digital catalogue, powered by Samsung.com, allows users to pay at the store in cash, again, delivering that unique online-offline shopping experience.
Samsung is also using its BKC store as a place to showcase some of the latest innovations that are yet to be officially launched in India. “Samsung is trying to unlock new categories at the BKC store to get into the ultra-premium and uber-premium segments, and using the store as a testbed for products. And, depending on the response, some of these products will be launched in India,” he added.
According to Valia, the AI experience at the Samsung BKC is not just limited to smartphones, it also showcases how it uses AI to offer personalisation. The brand also has home appliances such as the AI-enabled refrigerator, which understands the content of refrigerators and recommends recipes based on the products stored in the smart fridge. Samsung has even added AI to washing machines allowing it to understand the load and the sensitivity of the fabric to offer the most efficient laundry settings, all of which can be connected remotely from a smartphone via the SmartThings.
It’s not just Samsung – almost every major Android smartphone brand is trying to fit into the premium segment by launching exclusive stores that offer the best products and services. The number of exclusive stores from companies like OnePlus, Oppo, Vivo, and Xiaomi are steadily going up, which mainly focuses on offering a seamless shopping experience and service support.
