Best Buy is testing a tiny digital-first store that opens its doors Tuesday

Image: Best Buy

Best Buy is opening a digital-first, small-format store on Tuesday in Monroe, North Carolina, that takes a very different approach than most of its "big box" retail stores. Smaller Apple Stores are typically between 6,000 and 8,500 square feet, but the 5,000- square-foot Best Buy location is only 15 percent larger.

Last year, it was reported that Best Buy was testing downsized locations as small as 15,000 square feet, but this is much smaller and closer to the closed Best Buy Mobile store. The Charlotte area is where Best Buy launched five other test stores last year.

Unlike Best Buy's outlet stores and big locations, this new store will be equipped with a "curated selection" of Best Buy merchandise that includes large TVs, computers, headphones, wearables, cell phones, etc.

• Image: Best Buy
• Image: Best Buy
• Image: Best Buy

Visitors are greeted at the entrance by a 7-foot screen with information on what the store has to offer before they can shop.

You can browse items on the sales floor, but with the exception of smaller items eligible for mobile self-checkout, most of them are simply display units. When you want to buy a product, Best Buy has a Just Scan It process that you can use. The person will bring the item to the store.

There are other consultation areas for customers in-store, as well as members of the Geek Squad, so you don't have to worry about the location having blue shirt human interactions. You can get live shopping help in the store with an expert from someone in Best Buy's "Virtual store" via voice call, video call, or online chat.

Walmart and Best Buy are just two retailers that are rethinking their brick-and-mortar operating plans after customer behaviors shifted during the Pandemic. Amazon implemented new technology to improve in-person shopping for things that an online experience can't replace when it opened a brick and mortar clothing store in May.