The North Face’s new “retail lab” is testing tech for future stores. At the NY store, customers’ movements are tracked using heat mapping, so that the brand can measure how much time they spend in certain sections of the store versus others. They also nixed checkouts, instead equipping their employees with portable point-of-sale systems so shoppers can check out anywhere within the store. The North Face plans to use their learnings from the experimental outlet to design data-driven stores. (Digiday)
