Bharti Airtel Now Has 100 Next-Gen Stores in India

Bharti Airtel today announced the opening of its 100th Next-Gen Airtel Store in the country. The 100th Next-Gen store is located at Park Street in Kolkata. For the unaware, back in 2017, Airtel announced its first Next-Gen Store in India with an aim to directly interact with the customers. Next-Gen Airtel stores are part of the company’s digital programme Project Next which aims at simplifying customer experience. Airtel also opened such stores in various cities of the country like New Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru and so on. These stores are conceptualised by the UK based 8 Inc and they work on the concept of Share, Create and Experience.

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Next-Gen Store Staff are Called ‘Airtel Friends’

First of all, this is the first Next-Gen Airtel Store to launch in Kolkata and the telco today unveiled three such stores in the city. Airtel plans to roll out ten Next-Gen stores across Kolkata and other major cities across West Bengal over the coming months.

Vir Inder Nath, CEO – Retail, Bharti Airtel, said“We are delighted to launch our Next-Gen store format in Kolkata and bring the next level of retail experience to our customers. This launch is in line with our obsession to continuously improve the experience for our customers and win them for life with our innovative digital experience. These stores are based on insights from studying thousands of hours of customer traffic and we are confident that these stores will help us create excellence in every interaction we have with our customers.”

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Furthermore, Airtel has also introduced a new behaviour model for in-store staff to reflect the company’s ‘Serve-to-solve’ philosophy. The store staff in Next-Gen stores will be referred to as ‘Airtel Friends’ Talking more about the Airtel Next-Gen stores in the country, they come equipped with Quidini’s virtual queue management platform which will take care of seamless resolutions at the kiosks.

The completely paperless store also features conversation Hubs, where customers can comfortably have discussions with Airtel Friends with regards to their queries.

Airtel Next-Gen Stores Feature Three Zones

As noted above, the Next-Gen Airtel Stores have been conceptualised by the UK based 8 Inc. They feature three zones- Share, Create and Experience. In the Share zone, customers can interact with a Social Wall that collates Airtel Stories and Airtel customer experiences from across the country on a digital screen. The Create Zone allows customers to explore and discover Airtel services. In this zone, they can also design their own solutions digitally on a Touch Screen Table Top.

Lastly, Airtel Next-Gen stores feature Digital Entertainment Hubs in the Experience Zone which enables customers to explore and experience Airtel’s digital content offerings – movies, music, Live TV, games and more. The stores also come with Digital Self-Serve zones that allow customers to pay bills, buy a new SIM, all by themselves. In addition, customers can get a first-hand experience of the Airtel network with the Open Network digital wall and give real-time feedback.