Snap Opens Pop-Up Shop In Harrods

Snap has opened its first pop-up shop, selling Spectacles inside the famous London department store Harrods.

Tech Crunch reported that this is the first time customers can buy Spectacles in person and not through a Snapbot. Retailing for around $142, Spectacles are sunglasses that allow wearers to record 10-second video snaps of life from their perspective and then download those memories onto Snapchat. The glasses only work with Snapchat and are always on (although not always recording). Spectacles take about 100 10-second Snaps per charge.

Snapbot’s technology is impressive, but the camera company needs to expand if it wants to achieve widespread distribution of Spectacles, as well as future hardware devices. It hasn’t been confirmed, but there are rumors that Snap is working on a sequel to its video-enabled Spectacles glasses because of the company’s latest augmented reality–focused patent filing.

The traditional-looking shop features an Android phone docked to the kiosk, which looks like it’s showing off the 360-degree video that Spectacles can capture. There’s also an old-fashioned mirror for people to use when trying on the glasses. The low-tech approach can attract customers of all ages to the kiosk.

In addition to its pop-up store, Snap recently made Spectacles available to purchase on Amazon, which comes a few months after it started selling them on their own website directly to consumers. And Snap has also recently been putting Snapbots in major malls for several weeks at a time throughout the U.S., which is a big departure from the exclusivity that surrounded the device at launch.

These moves come as shares of Snap Inc. recently broke below the initial public offering (IPO) price, touching an intraday low of $16.95, below the March $17 offer price (the stock price rebounded to end the session at $16.99).  Investors have been concerned over user growth and the fact that Snapchat has not, and may never, be profitable.