Retail Store Tours helps Retailers navigate New York City at NRF 2026: Retail’s Big Show
Retail Store Tours (retailstoretours.com) is the official store tour of the NRF Retail’s Big Show in New York, Paris, Singapore, and is available in fifty cities worldwide. We help retailers navigate New York City’s best practices, innovation and technology in partnership with the NRF 2026: Retail’s Big Show. The Retail Store Tours team are experts who are retailers, academics, and New Yorkers.
NRF 2026: Retail’s Big Show kicks off on January 10, 2026, and continues through January 13 in New York City. Attendees will hear from leaders in the retail industry and visit the largest display of retail technology on the expo floor at the Javits Center, with more than a thousand exhibitors. The 2026 Retail’s Big Show features cutting-edge and innovative technology, experiences, and business models.
Retail Store Tour Timing:
January 10
10A-12P, 12:30-2:30P, 3P-5P
American Dream time is 10A-2P and 3P-7P
January 12 & 13
5:30-7:30P
Customized tours are available for your organization.
Please contact hello@retailstoretouts.com with further information on which tour is right for you.
The New York Retail Store Tour Experience
“New York City is the epicenter for retail innovation, and many retailers arrive early to experience the city’s vibrant and varied retail scene,” says Daniel Hodges, CEO of Consumers in Motion. Retail Store Tours (retailstoretours.com), in partnership with NRF 2026, offers Retail Store Tours, which are expert-led, highly curated, time-efficient guided walking tours of cutting-edge stores. Attendees experience the latest technology, store designs, employee training, and best practices. These tours, listed below, allow participants to gain insights from subject-matter experts, network with peers, and stay ahead of industry trends.
Retail Store Tours at NRF 2026: Retail’s Big Show Timing
January 10, 12, 13
Retail store tours are curated experiences that take you behind the scenes of innovative retail environments to explore cutting-edge design, technology, and customer engagement strategies. They're especially effective at exploring what makes top-performing stores tick. The stores selected for Retail Store Tours are based on several criteria:
Store Design and Layout: How physical space influences customer behavior
Tech Integration: Use of AI, AR/VR, smart mirrors, and mobile checkout
Brand Storytelling: How brands communicate through visuals, scent, sound, and service
Customer Experience Innovations: Personalized service, loyalty programs, and immersive environments.
The 2026 Retail Store Tours program is based on feedback and extensive conversations with retail executives from North and South America, Europe, Asia, and Africa.
Retail Store Tours
What Is It? Retail Store Tours are expert-led, curated, and time-efficient, with game-changing results and insights
Who Should Tour? All executive and operational levels
What Will I Learn? The eight Intelligent Engagement Factors that drive revenue
1. Retail Evolution & Innovation: American Dream
Held at American Dream and designed for tech and social media savvy retailers, this tour provides a technologically enhanced experience, including smart, integrated digital signage; social media experiences; AR experiences throughout the entire environment; and evolutionary and revolutionary displays.
· What Is It? Explore a state-of-the-art experience center
· Who Should Tour? IT Managers, CDO, CTO, CMO
· What Will I Learn? How design drives engagement
2. People-Centric, Purpose-Driven Shopping Experiences: SoHo
Nowhere is the scale and diversity of retail more pronounced than in SoHo, known worldwide for its innovative artistry and artfulness. Here, retail is unbound, spilling all over the streets in a kaleidoscope of forms. Side by side with iconic stores are avant-garde pop-ups that won’t be around tomorrow. The randomness is inspirational, and it adds to the neighborhood’s excitement. We’ll show you why SoHo is the place that brands come to reinvent themselves.
· What Is It? Experience a diverse set of stores and business models
· Who Should Tour? The entire retail GTM teams
· What Will I Learn? How business models are created and tested before they scale
3. Iconic Retailers and Best Practices - Fifth Avenue
On this tour, we meet with the best-in-class retailers on Fifth Avenue, home to the finest shopping, dining, and cultural destinations in NYC. For more than a century, it has been the definition of glamour for both visitors and locals, and it continues to be a place to experience the best of the best. From flagship boutiques such as Tiffany’s, Gucci, Saks, and Bergdorf’s and cultural spots such as MoMA and St. Patrick’s Cathedral, to luxury hotels just a few steps away from Central Park, Fifth Avenue has something for everyone to enjoy.
· What Is It? Learn how iconic brands have thrived over the past hundred plus years
· Who Should Tour? Operations, marketing, executive level
· What Will I Learn? How successful brands have integrated best practices into the brand DNA and culture
4. Innovation and Reinvention - Flatiron District
This always-changing New York City neighborhood makes for the perfect walking tour for new stores, business models, and retail innovation and best practices. The Flatiron Design District offers the widest range of décor, furniture, and flagship concept stores, with some vintage thrown in for good measure. Your expert will lead you on an exclusive, curated experience to expand your appetite and appreciation of design-driven hospitality and new business models.
· What Is It? Experience store and business models made to cater to the neighborhood
· Who Should Tour? Our companies have utilized stores are three-dimensional learning centers.
· What Will I Learn? How stores are used for consumer engagement and to create new products and models
5. The Transformation Tour: Wall Street
Wall Street is the birthplace of innovation and the modern-day epicenter of the global economy. We will visit and go behind the scenes at innovative food, fashion, and luxury destinations while walking in the neighborhood where George Washington and Alexander Hamilton worked.
· What Is It? Learn how Wall Street and the founding fathers developed new business concepts to create the most vibrant retail market in the world
· Who Should Tour? Executives who want to experience best-in-class innovation and out-of-the-box thinking
· What Will I Learn? We will visit stores and other locations that epitomize innovation
