Published: May 29, 2025 ✍️ Author: Global World Citizen Tech & Retail Desk 🌐 Source: GlobalWorldCitizen.com 📍 Category: Tech Business | AI Wearables | Retail Innovation
Meta, the parent company of Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp, is quietly working on plans to expand its physical retail presence—a move that could reshape the way consumers engage with AI-powered wearables and metaverse hardware.
According to an internal communication seen by Business Insider, Meta is developing a new retail strategy that includes opening physical stores and hiring retail employees to support product engagement and brand visibility.
This retail push marks Meta’s boldest move yet to bring its AI-driven smart glasses, VR headsets, and future wearable technologies directly to the hands of consumers—similar to Apple’s global store model.
Meta Store 2.0: From Pop-Ups to Permanent Retail
Meta currently operates a single flagship Meta Store located at its Burlingame, California campus, opened in 2022. This showroom-style space allows customers to experience Meta Quest VR headsets, Ray-Ban Meta smart glasses, and other immersive tech.
In 2024, the company tested its retail model with Meta Lab, a pop-up store in Los Angeles aimed at boosting smart glasses sales.
It remains unclear how many stores Meta intends to open or the full timeline, but internal signals suggest an ambitious retail rollout is in motion.
Smart Glasses Sales Drive the Vision
Meta sold over 1 million smart glasses in 2024—a promising start, but one that CEO Mark Zuckerberg acknowledged as still “not moving the needle” for the company’s larger revenue ambitions.
“2025 will tell us whether this becomes a long-term grind or if AI glasses become a dominant computing platform,” Zuckerberg said in an all-hands meeting earlier this year.
Meta’s growing portfolio of AI-powered wearables is seen as the next frontier in consumer tech. The company plans to launch six new AI devices this year alone, according to internal communications from CTO Andrew Bosworth.
The Tech Retail Race: Meta vs Apple, Amazon, and OpenAI
As Meta enters the tech retail arena, it’s going head-to-head with giants:
Apple has over 500 Apple Stores globally, merging sleek hardware and premium in-store experiences.
Amazon experimented with Amazon Go and Amazon Fresh, though it has scaled back recently.
OpenAI, in partnership with Jony Ive, is now developing a new class of AI devices, signaling intensified competition in next-gen personal tech.
Meta’s retail plan isn’t just about selling devices—it’s about building a physical platform for the AI era and reshaping how consumers experience mixed reality and metaverse computing.
GlobalWorldCitizen.com Insight
Meta’s retail ambitions reflect a pivotal shift in the future of commerce and tech engagement. As AI wearables, smart glasses, and VR become household items, retail stores will be key to mass adoption.
What Apple did for smartphones, Meta hopes to do for AI glasses, the metaverse, and spatial computing—creating not just products, but platforms that redefine reality.
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