Jan. 20 (UPI) -- Amazon announced Thursday it will open its first in-person clothing store, called Amazon Style, in the Los Angeles area later this year.
The company widely known for its e-commerce business plans to offer customers the best of both worlds by combining its shopping app technology with the physical store, according to the announcement.
"Our first-ever physical apparel store offers a personalized, convenient shopping experience where Amazon's technology and operations make it easy for customers to find styles they love at great prices," Amazon Style Managing Director Simoina Vasen said in the statement.
Vasen said customers can scan display items in the store through a mobile Amazon Shopping app to send them to a fitting room, which has a touchscreen to request different sizes and colors instead of having "to sift through racks to find the right color, size and fit."
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Customers will also be able to access their in-store purchase history in the Amazon app, Vasen told CNBC, but unlike Whole Food Stores, which Amazon owns, Amazon Style stores won't offer special discounts for Prime subscribers.
While Vasen said the app offers a "seamless and elevated shopping experience," some other retailers, have similar technology, such as Nike flagship stores, which have scan codes on items to be sent directly to fitting rooms. And another store, American Eagle, has tested tablets for shoppers to request different sizes and styles from fitting rooms.
Last March, Amazon unseated Walmart to become the No. 1 apparel retail in the United States, but in-store purchases, make up about 85% of U.S. retail sales, and customers often want to try clothes on before they buy them.
Amazon opened its first physical store, Amazon Books, in Seattle, in 2015, and two years later it took over Whole Foods and slashed prices.
