INTERACTIVE AND ENTERTAINING STORES.

• Position: New trends in retail marketing - Brief Article

Consumers are getting more of what they increasingly demand from retailers these days. They want--and get--more entertainment, high-tech, and interaction from retail stores than ever before.

According to Karen Schaffner, publisher of Display & Design Ideas magazine, entertainment is a significant factor in drawing customers and then encouraging them to stay. Whether it is creating a lounge area where teenage girls can hang out or a souped-up demo area that appeals to men, stores are being built to create customer participation.

"The future of retailing includes such technologies as touchscreens, body scanning, biometric identification, real-time Web broadcasts, and faster, more-accessible multimedia content? she notes. "The result will be a shopping experience that is greatly enhanced--but not frivolous. Experts agree that these technologies must make sense in order to justify the investment of money and floor space."

In San Francisco, for...