PLANO, Tex.--With an aim toward customer convenience, CompUSA has installed SoftwareToGo kiosks in about 25 stores in the Dallas, San Francisco and Seattle areas. The goal is to install the self-service machines in about 225 stores nationwide this year.
Using a touchscreen, CompUSA customers can search for software titles by name, category or publisher, place an order and pick it up on a CD at the checkout counter, according to the Associated Press.
The majority of software will be sold in this way within the next few years, forecast Bruce Newman, president of the machines' maker, Protocall Technologies of Commack, N.Y.
CompUSA offers about 900 titles, from games to spreadsheets, by more than 200 software publishers and is trying to line up more. There are more than 20 titles from Activision, 10 from Edmark, more than a dozen from Microsoft and Symantec but none from Broderbund, Electronic Arts, Adobe or Intuit.
"It broadens the number of titles without needing to carry the extra inventory, and it will diversify offerings into things like Spanish-language titles," Tony Weiss, president and chief operating officer of Dallas-based CompUSA, told the AP.
