Meta is Reportedly Planning to Open Retail Stories to Sell VR, AR and Other Digital Connection Tools

A new article on Social Media Today reports that with Facebook – or Meta as its parent brand is now known – gradually expanding its catalog of physical products, it makes sense that the company would also be considering physical stores as well, as a means to better showcase its next-level hardware designs.

According to The New York Times leaked internal documents outline plans for IRL Facebook stores through which it would sell its VR headsets, AR glasses, Portal devices and more:

“Meta has discussed opening retail stores that will eventually span the world, said people with knowledge of the project and company documents viewed by The New York Times. The stores would be used to introduce people to devices made by the company’s Reality Labs division, such as virtual reality headsets and, eventually, augmented reality glasses.”

The broader idea is that in order to guide users towards Meta’s vision of the metaverse, an immersive digital world of endless possibilities, Meta will need to get more of these tools into more homes, and physical stores could be a better way to establish direct-to-consumer supply chains, while also enabling new showcase opportunities to generate more sales. Meta’s VR headsets seem like the most obvious focus in this respect, with the company’s fully-enabled metaverse vision aligned around wholly interactive VR worlds, which would only truly be possible in the VR environment.

Right now, you can buy Facebook’s products in retail stores, but they’re lining the shelves alongside many other competing devices and options, and don’t generally get specific focus. If Facebook wanted to invest more into direct marketing, and showcasing its next-level plans, it would be best-placed to do so via its own, dedicated promotion and product displays, which it could directly control within its own stores, built specifically around its offerings.