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The Verge says look, nevermind that Amazon’s reviews are getting less and less trustworthy; I still often find myself scanning a thing’s barcode or just pulling up its Amazon listing when I’m at a store to get a sense of whether it’s a decent buy. With its latest store, Amazon isn’t leaving that question up in the air anymore. The first-ever Amazon 4-star opens in New York City’s Soho neighborhood tomorrow. And as the name implies, everything on its shelves has earned at least a four-star review average from Amazon’s customers.
The store will also have new and “trending” items and best-sellers regardless of review score. Of course you’ll find a ton of Amazon hardware, but there’s plenty of third-party stuff too covering “devices, consumer electronics, kitchen, home, toys, books, and games.”
“Today, the average rating of all the products in Amazon 4-star is 4.4 stars, and collectively, the products in store have earned more than 1.8 million 5-star customer reviews,” the company said in a press release introducing the retail store. Amazon already operates a couple of its regular Amazon Books locations in Manhattan. As with those stores, shoppers at Amazon 4-star will pay the Amazon.com price for an item if they’re a Prime member; non-subscribers will have to pay the list price — unless they want to start a free trial of Prime to get the lower one.
Here’s more from Amazon on what’ll be inside:
Throughout the store there are features like “Most-Wished-For,” a collection of products that are most added to Amazon.com Wish Lists; “Trending Around NYC,” hot products that NYC-area customers are buying on Amazon.com; “Frequently Bought Together”; and “Amazon Exclusives.” These features, along with customer review cards with quotes from actual customer reviews, make it fun and easy to shop.
It’s not quite as off-the-beaten-path as Amazon’s cashier-free stores, but at least you’ll have a good sense that nothing at Amazon 4-star is total junk. Unless the reviews for said item have been gamed.
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