Meta, formerly the Facebook company, announced the opening of its first physical retail shop on May 9 in California, the US near the Reality Labs campus. It is a development and research hub for virtual reality products. . The 1,550-square feet store will have products including Meta’s video chat device portal, and Meta’s first ever pair of smart glasses with Ray-Ban.
Head of Meta store Martin Gillard stated that the Meta store is the way to help people make that connection to how their products could turn out to be the doorway to the metaverse in the coming time. He also said that though they are not selling metaverse in their store, they hope to see people in their store to know more about how their products are going to help people connect to them.
A store giving hands-on experience to its customers
Interestingly, the customers will be able to play games on Oculus Quest 2 in a demo area. Oculus Quest 2 is a modernized version of Oculus Go- the virtual reality headset. Whatever people will see in the headset will be projected on a floor-to-ceiling LED screen.
Another demo area is kept for Meta’s video chat device portal where the portal will be displayed on the main floor of the store.
A discrete cubicle with glass is specially earmarked for Meta’s selection of Ray-Ban Stories. These are the smart glasses that let wearers record videos via an in-built 5MP camera. However, unlike the other products available in the Meta store, the customers will not be able to buy smart glasses from the store. They have to order the glasses directly from Ray Ban’s website.
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg in an Instagram post wrote that he feels great to see how their products and services are connecting people today and get a sense for what’s coming as they build towards the metaverse.
Earlier in January, H&M also opened its first ever store in the metaverse.
