As the end of 2017 approaches, the annual Holiday shopping spree is drawing to a close. For years now, online shopping has increased in popularity due to convenience and lack of jostling crowds. This switch from traditional shopping methods has been great for online retailers, such as Amazon and Jet!, but has made it difficult for brick-and-mortar shops to compete. Physical shops have lost sales for years to online retailers, but this year they turned to new technology to try and entice shoppers out of their cozy homes and back into the malls. This technology isn't just great for physical stores, but can also be implemented at events. Event planners take note!
How are they doing this? Augmented reality (AR). AR has been a hot topic for years and we predicted AR as a tech trend to look out for in 2017. It looks like AR is expected to take off in 2018 and the new forms of adoption show that AR isn't "just for fun" (think: Pokémon Go and Snapchat filters).