E*Trade Group has opened its second high-tech financial services superstore, this time in Denver. The move follows the April 2001 opening of E*Trade's first high street superstore in New York.
The superstore's Denver location builds upon the company's three existing E*Trade Zones in Colorado, located in Superior, Littleton and Thornton, and its 85 ATMs across the state.
Customers will be able to to open accounts in person, make financial transactions in their E*Trade Bank and E*Trade Securities brokerage accounts, participate in educational seminars and receive personal assistance.
The centre is approximately 3700 square feet and is equipped with fifteen computer desktop workstations and seven E*Trade Pro screens. The superstore also offers twelve plasma screens which play original E*Trade content and daily financial news programming, and three touch-screen financial information kiosks.
E*Trade plans to open three more superstores in San Francisco, Beverly Hills and Boston over the next several months.
The importance of a physical consumer presence has been emphasised in a recent analysis of third quarter trade data by Standard & Poor's, which found online execution-only brokers such as E*Trade and Schwab losing out to established full-service firms during the current stockmarket downturn.