Tower Records Deploys TouchMedia's in-store Digital Media Stations

PRWeb says:

TouchMedia and Tower Records, America’s leading independent music and movie retailer, today announced the completion of a nationwide rollout of over 330 custom digital media stations throughout Tower’s 89 US locations. TouchMedia’s new family of digital media stations is a comprehensive line of multi-purpose, touch screen devices that, depending on configuration, allow consumers to search, scan, discover, preview and purchase physical and digital media products.

Sounds like a big deal, right? Well, it might be, someday. But read on:

Over the course of a 6 month trial program with the TouchMedia platform in their Seattle, Denver, and Tempe stores, Tower Records management team analyzed the system’s positive impact on sales, store efficiency and customer satisfaction which ultimately led to Tower’s selection of TouchMedia as their in-store digital media and technology provider. The digital media stations have been retrofitted into Tower’s existing CD listening station fixtures which now feature interactive touch screen technology, media discovery and preview capabilities, and the digital downloading of promotional music to portable storage devices and a growing list of portable media players.

So it looks like they'll be trying to focus on real, tangible ROI from the interactive kiosks (since that's what they are) before deciding whether or not to roll out to the rest of the chain. While it would be wonderful if Tower and/or TouchMedia decided to publish their results at the end of the trial (regardless of how they went), this is probably not very likely to happen ;)