A footwear wall that behaves like ecommerce
The future of instore displays is here. With this example you will see how today’s instore displays are evolving to meet our online experiences.
Adidas has created an in-store digital experience that was described at the time as showcasing over 8,000 Adidas shoes. The technology can be easily deployed to allow almost any retailer to sell the entire Adidas product range without having to be a flagship store in a major city.
How the adiVerse wall runs in-store
The experience is defined by a large footwear wall, made of multiple LCD touch screens that use facial recognition to detect a customer’s gender on approach to the wall. The adiVerse virtual footwear wall then customizes the product experience for that gender, and helps guide them to the perfect shoe.
Alternatively it lets them browse the entire range of products, with each shoe rendered in real-time 3D.
Endless aisle is a retail setup where a store sells the full catalogue digitally, even if only a fraction of it is physically stocked on the shelf.
In multi-brand sporting goods retail, bridging endless-aisle breadth with guided discovery is the difference between “too much choice” and “the right choice”.
Why it feels like online shopping, only bigger
This is essentially ecommerce browsing translated into a shared physical surface. You can scan, filter, compare, and inspect details, but the store controls the pacing and the context.
The mechanism that matters is the blend of quick orientation plus depth on demand. The wall can help you narrow down, then let you dive into a single shoe in 3D with richer content when you care.
Content depth for the winners, speed for everything else
The most popular products in the range get the full content play, including videos, game stats, product specs and even twitter feeds. Everything else stays light, so browsing does not become slow or confusing.
This “tiered content” approach is a practical way to keep performance high while still making hero products feel premium.
The retail play hiding inside the screens
In the end customers can add their selected product into a virtual cart, and check out via an iPad that the store sales staff would have.
That last step is the business intent. Sell the long tail without expanding floor space, while keeping checkout and assistance inside the store experience.
The adiVerse Virtual Footwear Wall is an in-store touchscreen wall that lets shoppers browse a large adidas shoe catalogue, inspect products in real-time 3D, and hand selections to store staff for checkout via tablet.
What to steal for your own digital wall
- Build an endless aisle that feels curated. Offer the full catalogue, but guide to a shortlist fast.
- Use tiered content deliberately. Deep media for hero products. Lightweight data for everything else.
- Make staff checkout the final bridge. Tablets in hand keep conversion human and immediate.
- Design for “public browsing”. Big screens invite group decisions. The UI should support that.
A few fast answers before you act
What is the adiVerse Virtual Footwear Wall?
It is an in-store wall of touchscreen displays that lets shoppers browse a large adidas shoe catalogue, view shoes as real-time 3D models, and hand selections to staff for checkout via tablet.
How does it personalize the experience?
It uses facial recognition to detect a customer’s gender as they approach, then adapts the browsing and guidance flow to that mode, while still allowing full catalogue exploration.
What business problem does it solve for retailers?
It enables an endless aisle: stores can sell a much broader range without stocking every model, while keeping product discovery and checkout inside the physical store experience.