Hey, My Shoe Finder Needs A Recharge

Lucky Magazine glorifies the shopping experience, but today, the Condé Nast-owned media brand is getting transactional.
According to New York Times, Lucky is introducing an iPhone application, Lucky at Your Service, that ties into stores’ inventories.

Shoppers browse by type of shoe, brand, color or size. Anyone who chooses, say, the Diane von Furstenberg “Harlot” espadrille wedge, can click the “Find It Near You” button. That will use either GPS or a ZIP code to determine which stores in the area have that shoe available.
Lucky, which is not collecting fees for the service, has even hired a call center, staffed with 20 to 200 representatives, who will confirm that the shoe is available and set it aside, text-messaging a shopper that, say, Jessie in the second-floor salon shoe department at the downtown Nordstrom has set it aside.

BTW, iPhone App development is exploding. Small development teams are creating products that sell for five bucks (or thereabouts) in the iTunes store. When thousands of buyers download the App a business is born.
I think it’s great to see Lucky pursue this. More brands and their agency partners need to figure out how to best utilize the mobile platform–information as service or advertainment/gaming are good paths to follow.