Quick Pitch: Think Foursquare-meets-Yelp for shopping malls.
Genius Idea: FastMall is a website and an iPhone app that acts as both a mall directory/map/guide and a tool offering you local deals at stores, reviews of shops and eateries and fast access to information such as parking and restroom locations.
Like many other red-blooded Americans who grew up in the suburbs of a major city, I love my malls. In fact, I’ve had the layout of Atlanta’s major malls memorized since… well, let’s just say I’ve always know my way around Lenox, Phipp’s Plaza and Perimeter.
That isn’t to say that I don’t sometimes forget what mall has my favorite store or food court stand, or that when I travel to other places, I know the malls in those locales. That’s where FastMall comes in: it is designed to be your guide to a mall — complete with maps, a place to store parking info, a store directory with phone numbers and the ability to read and submit reviews and turn-by-turn directions.
There’s also a social element involved that lets you “check-in” a la Foursquare to a store or mall and find deals at the shops near you.
The FastMall website has the information for the detailed mall maps (which include some big malls like the Beverly Center and the Mall of America), but the iPhone apps includes store listings even for malls that don’t yet have a fully-featured interactive map.
The idea behind FastMall is to create a platform that can eventually extend to amusement parks and other types of venues. We think that’s really smart and that the app (and the site) is really onto something. FastMall isn’t a competitor to Foursquare and the like; it’s a niche-focused app that will help you find out what you need when at a venue or location with lots of shops.
By popular demand we have completed these 2 interactive virtual mall maps and within the next week we will have another 50+ new malls fully interactive for you.
Its all FREE, go get them now and look for updates, new features and new interactive maps for your mall, hotel, hospital, airport, theme park soon
FastMall: Free app, for your mall map(s)! Navigate a whole load of malls with detailed interior maps, which is much easiest that hunting down a physical key, and much less fogey-like. Added bonus: This app helps you get in and out of malls faster, which is great, because malls are universally terrible, and actually shorten your life, because a minute spent in a mall is a minute spent not not being in a mall, where actual human life happens.
Directionally challenged shoppers, take heart. There’s an app for that.
FastMall is a free iPhone download that works sort of like an indoor Google Map. FastMall can help shoppers navigate through the maze of stores, find restaurant peer reviews, and (of course) get coupons and exclusive deals.
Parents with strollers can locate escalators and elevators. A GPS function can reunite parking ramp wanderers with their cars. FastMall even provides a turn-by-turn route to the nearest restroom.
FastMall is a product of New York-based MindSmack, which does Web development for such companies as Citibank and IBM. The program launched in mid-December, and was upgraded a little more than a week ago.
Fast Mall makes sure you don’t get lost while shopping.
Tired of trying to find the Cinnabon in your local mall by having to sniff it out? The Fast Mall application will make sure you get there without having to use your nose – just your iPhone.
There’s no cellphone service required for this app to work, so even if your reception is spotty while strolling your favorite shops, this thing still gets you to the sale at Victoria’s Secret or to American Eagle Outfitters for some tight, preppy polos with no problem.
It also gives you turn-by-turn directions to the nearest restrooms and elevators, so you can strategically plan out your bathroom breaks in between shopping and sipping Ice Blendeds (I’m sure this will tell you where the Coffee Bean counter is too).
Probably the most useful feature to this app is the parking finder that brings you right back to where you parked – no more having to write P3/blue on your hand anymore. This thing also notifies you about sales and promotions going on in the mall you’re in.
As someone without an iPhone, I’ll still be relying on the large color-coded mall directory and the actual people at the information kiosk to tell me where I’m going.
For the more tech-advanced mall-goer, the Fast Mall app is a free download for the iPhone.
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FastMall is proud to help develop this iPhone app to assist in any way we can.
For those intrepid shoppers who’ve ever gotten lost in a shopping mall or wondered how to get to their favorite store, this app is for you. FastMall for the iPhone provides turn-by-turn directions to help you find your way around the shopping mall maze. Over 1,275 malls are listed including local favorites like the Grove and the Beverly Center. The iPhone will automatically list the closest malls to you let your download maps, find deals, and navigate to stores using interactive directions that work indoors. Need to use the restroom? Shake your iPhone to find the nearest one. The app even remembers where you parked. FIND YOUR WAY: FastMall is free in the App Store.
