Amazon adds a third Amazon Go store in Seattle

Dive Brief:

Amazon has opened its third Amazon Go store in Seattle in the city's South Lake Union neighborhood in a building that also contains Amazon offices, just days after opening the second location for its cashierless convenience store concept, according to the Seattle Times.
The third store location is listed on Amazon's website as 300 Boren Ave. N. in the e-commerce giant's home market. That spot is about 1.5 miles from the second Amazon Go store, which opened last week at 920 5th Ave., and less than one mile from the first Amazon Go store at 2131 7th Ave.
The newest store reportedly is the largest Amazon Go location yet, at about 2,100 square feet, according to the Seattle Times story.

Dive Insight:

Amazon apparently is not afraid to pack its home market with multiple Amazon Go locations. While there has been much speculation about the timing of the company's widely reported plans to open Amazon Go stores in other cities, such as San Francisco and Chicago, the company is opening new locations in Seattle at a break-neck pace and potentially learning a lot about how to set up and open these stores in a precise and efficient fashion.

It will be interesting to see if the close proximity of the three Seattle stores yields useful data about foot traffic the multiple locations may have in common, or if certain merchandise sells better in one store than another. But, Amazon is still early in trying out a new model in a business that is still very new, and there is a lot to learn from these three stores that could inform how Amazon Go is expanded into additional markets.

Amazon is still experimenting with the format. The third Amazon Go store reveals little about how big future Amazon Go stores will be, and if the company plans to decide on a standard size for its stores. At 2,100 square feet, the latest location has been reported to be the biggest one yet, larger than the pilot store's size of around 1,800 square feet and the second location's 1,450 square feet.

Amazon doesn't necessarily need to take a cookie cutter approach with its Amazon Go stores. It can employ different size stores and different product selections based on what it thinks the core market is in a particular neighborhood. Taking a more standardized approach might help Amazon open more Amazon Go stores more quickly to stay ahead of rapidly growing competition, but right now it doesn't look like Amazon is having any problems with its rate of expansion.