Amazon Is Closing Its 87 Electronics Pop-up Kiosks Including 8 in Texas

Amazon is planning its physical store future without its first effort of electronics pop-up kiosks.It's closing all 87 locations, including eight in Texas and two in Dallas-Fort Worth at Grapevine Mills and The Parks at Arlington.Amazon started opening the kiosks, which sell its Echo, Fire TV, Fire Tablets, and Kindle electronics, in 2014 in a couple of California malls and later in 2017 as shops inside Kohl's stores in California and Illinois.The other Texas electronics pop-ups are in Houston at the Galleria, the Woodlands Mall, Katy Mills, Willowbrook Mall and Baybrook Mall and in San Antonio at North Star Mall. Grapevine Mills, The Parks at Arlington and Woodlands Mall also were trade-in locations for Kindle e-readers and Fire tablets.The closings, which were first reported by the Wall Street Journal, are expected to be completed by the end of April. Kohl's CEO Michelle Gass said during a conference call on Tuesday that 30 Amazon kiosks in the company's department stores would close.At the same time, Amazon said it's moving ahead with its Amazon Books stores and a new concept it opened last year in New York called Amazon 4-star. There's only one Amazon Books in Texas, at Austin's Domain Northside. Also, Amazon hasn't confirmed widely reported plans that it may open as many as 3,000 of its cashierless Amazon Go convenience stores. So far nine locations, which it markets as a place that sells "good fast food," are open in Seattle, San Francisco and Chicago.Amazon, which sees groceries as an important part of its ongoing growth, is cooking up a grocery store concept likely with the staff at Austin-based Whole Foods Market, which it purchased in 2017. The first one is expected to open late this year in Los Angeles, the Wall Street Journal reported. "We're planning to do other formats as well," said John Mackey, CEO of Whole Foods Market last month without elaborating. He made the comments at a Texas Tribune event at UT Austin on Feb. 28 during an interview with the publication's CEO Evan Smith.New store concepts came up in the context of Whole Foods' decision to not move forward with its 365 branded stores. A dozen of those opened in the last four years and they just didn't do as well as regular Whole Foods, Mackey said."It wasn't an Amazon decision," he said. "Everything Amazon gets blamed for are lies and pretty much everything it gets credit for isn't true."His point, he said, is that Whole Foods is still making decisions. Mackey called the $13.7 billion merger a marriage, and said, "Amazon is supporting us, but they aren't the puppet master. They are helping us to be better."  Continue reading...