Microsoft Expands Retail Surface With 32 New Holiday Stores

As part of the big retail push that will follow the launch of Windows 8 and its forthcoming Surface tablet, Microsoft will open a number of holiday stores in the U.S. and Canada. And on Monday morning, the company announced the 32 markets it has chosen for these pop-up brick-and-mortar storefronts. The full list is below, but the locales Microsoft has selected are what you’d expect: Miami, San Francisco, Las Vegas, Atlanta ….

Expanding its retail footprint in this way is a savvy move for Microsoft, which will soon debut its latest Windows OS and, along with it, Surface, a tablet of its own design. The company has said it will sell Surface only through its own retail stores and Microsoft.com. And with fewer than two dozen Microsoft Stores in the U.S. right now, the opportunies for consumers curious about Surface to have some hands-on time with the device would be few and far between. Adding another 32 temporary stores in malls around the country will do much to change that and ensure that Surface gets the sort of consumer attention Microsoft is hoping for. And it gives the company a few more chances to generate some holiday buzz around Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8, as well.

Here’s the complete list of malls where Microsoft will open pop-up stores:

· Aventura Mall — Aventura, FL

· Beachwood Place — Beachwood, OH

· Cherry Creek Shopping Center — Denver, CO

· Dadeland Mall — Miami, FL

· Eaton Centre — Toronto, ON

· Fashion Mall at Keystone — Indianapolis, IN

· Fashion Show Mall — Las Vegas, NV

· Glendale Galleria — Glendale, CA

· Mall at Green Hills — Nashville, TN

· Mall in Columbia — Columbia, MD

· Metropolis at Metrotown — Burnaby, BC

· Montgomery Mall — Bethesda, MD

· Natick Collection — Natick, MA

· North Star Mall — San Antonio, TX

· Oakridge Centre — Vancouver, BC

· Penn Square Mall — Oklahoma City, OK

· Perimeter Mall — Atlanta, GA

· Roosevelt Field Mall — Garden, City, NY

· Ross Park Mall — Pittsburgh, PA

· Saint Louis Galleria — St. Louis, MO

· San Francisco Centre — San Francisco, CA

· South Shore Plaza — Braintree, MA

· Southpark Mall — Charlotte, NC

· Stonebriar Centre Mall — Frisco, TX

· Streets at Southpoint — Durham, NC

· Time Warner Center – The Shops at Columbus Circle — New York, NY

· Washington Square — Portland, OR

· West Edmonton Mall — Edmonton, AL

· Westfarms Mall – West Hartford, CT

· Westfield Garden State Plaza — Paramus, NJ

· Woodland Hills Mall — Tulsa, OK

· Woodlands Mall — Woodlands, TX