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Nordstrom's New Melrose Place Store Literally Won't Stock Any Clothes
Nordstrom Local on Melrose Place. (Image courtesy of Nordstrom)
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Most clothing stores sell you an idea about a lifestyle while also selling you clothes. It's Consumerism 101: buy this shirt, and you too could live the ideal life conjured by the carefully curated candle selection, music and furnishings around that T-shirt rack. The forthcoming West Hollywood Nordstrom will see this truth and raise it a step further: they will literally stock no merchandise.
Instead, the new Nordstrom Local "will have one styling suite and eight dressing rooms surrounding a central meeting space where customers can sit comfortably, enjoy a glass of wine or beer, and chat with their Personal Stylists," according to a press release. At 3,000 square feet of prime Melrose Place real estate, Nordstrom Local will also be substantially smaller than the average non-Emperor's-New-Clothes-themed luxury Nordstrom department store, which typically spans 140,000 square feet.
Personal stylists at the "service-focused concept store" on Melrose Place will be able to transfer in merchandise for customers. It remains unclear where said merchandise will be transferred from. (The Nordstrom megastore that is relocating from the Westside Pavilion to Century City on the same day that Nordstrom Local opens? Some off-site warehouse?
The Upside Down?)
Alterations and tailoring services will be offered on-site. Customers will also be able to order things from Nordstrom.com and pick them up the same day (as long as they are ordered by 2 p.m.) at the Nordstrom Local, because obviously people who buy things online want to then get in their cars and pick them up in person. Items ordered elsewhere "can be hand-delivered to a customer's car via Curbside Pickup," as opposed to, say, delivered by a robot. Which surely isn't far off.
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There will also be a "full beverage menu" including California-sourced beer and wine, cold-pressed juices from Pressed Juicery, and handcrafted espresso drinks from our Nordstrom Ebar. Customers will also be able to get "eight different manicure services" (sidenote: WTF are the seven other manicure services besides just paying another person to paint your nails?) and work with Trunk Club stylists while at Nordstrom Local.
Nordstrom Local will open on October 3rd, which isthe 14th anniversary of Roy of Siegfried & Roy being attacked by a tiger during the duo's Las Vegas show, when audience members were shocked to realize that the mauling wasn't an illusion, or part of the show. It is also the 22nd anniversary of O.J. Simpson's acquittal in the Nicole Brown Simpson/Ronald Goldman murder trial.
"As the retail landscape continues to transform at an unprecedented pace, the one thing we know that remains constant is that customers continue to value great service, speed and convenience," said Shea Jensen, Nordstrom senior vice president of customer experience who led the Nordstrom Local initiative. Shea is right. Everything is moving too fast. None of this makes any sense. Stop the world, I want to get off.
Nordstrom Local will be located at 8401 Melrose Place in West Hollywood. It will open on October 3.
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