Tesco has rolled out QR code and Augmented Reality (AR) window shopping at 11 of its Metro stores in the run up to Christmas. The stores are at Newcastle Eldon Square, Bristol Broadmead, Canterbury, Gravesend, Harlow, Peterborough, Kensington High Street, Birmingham Caxton, Manchester, Cardiff and Liverpool.

The window displays will enable shoppers to buy goods from their mobiles without setting foot in the store. Featured products will include Christmas gifts such as children’s bikes, best-selling toys and Tesco’s new home ware range. When the code is scanned, the product appears on the customer’s phone and they are able to buy it and then collect from the store the following day.

This may seem a little counter-intuitive, but makes more sense when you realise that the goods you can buy from the window displays are not normally available in Tesco Metro outlets. So a shopper who typically visits one of the Metro stores to pick up some milk or bread can now also get some of their Christmas shopping done there.

Tesco has also installed a bespoke, high-street Christmas window display in its Regent Street Metro store in London, where a 6-foot biscuit house takes centre stage. The window showcases Tesco’s finest food range and its wide range, plus gifts and decorations. Once again, all products in the display are available online at Tesco.com (though there’s no QR code or AR interaction this time). Customers can click to buy, then collect from that Metro store the following day.