I wouldn't mind paying a few pounds for them to let me browse the products. Maybe this is a viable business model.

Maybe they can offer a super wide selection available to see, since they don't need to carry stock. And perhaps you can order from them if you like it, and they run an online store where they ship it from, and you get your $10 back as a discount.

This is basically describing the Amazon stores.

Another approach is the manufacturer showroom. They don't care where you buy it so they just try to induce the demand.

But it's not very common. I expected showrooming to develop into a more formalized thing but it really hasn't. I guess between Walmart and B&M chains like Best Buy that have managed to stabilize for the most part, there hasn't been a compelling need for manufacturers to establish a showroom presence.

This is one point the article forgot (or didn't catch) to touch upon. I would like to go buy items in-store but I always hesitate to make the purchase because I know that same item will likely be significantly cheaper somewhere online. Of course, when I go online to find that product, I get distracted by the score of other options available leading to further indecision.

It is especially weird when it's cheaper online on the SAME store. That happened with me in brazil.

What's worse is when the store won't honor their own online price. That happened to me in the US, I think it was Walmart.

They recently honored it for me. 20% difference.

Rumor has it that a certain US retailer has an online store that tries to determine whether you are checking prices from inside their physical store, and raises the advertised price to match those of the store you are in.

Happened to me in target the other day.

At Target, at the checkout you can show them the price on their own website, and they will sell it to you for the online price.