An old Macy's learns new tricks

The big picture: Although this stuff is at the cutting edge of what’s available in the U.S., it's old news in China. They are going to have to do better.

• In the furniture department of Macy's, you can slip on Oculus headsets to picture a sofa or a dining table in your home. You can swap pieces in and out, and walk around to see how everything fits.
• You can virtually try on hundreds of eyeliners, mascaras and lipsticks without getting your hands dirty.
• A new feature called "Market" takes on Amazon — a section of the store reserved for smaller brands that have flourished online but want to get into brick-and-mortar stores.

But, but, but: All of these features and more have been commonplace in China for years.

• JD.com has mastered unmanned store technology in China and is beginning to take the concept abroad.
• Alibaba has long incorporated augmented and virtual reality into its brick-and-mortar outposts, including at the Starbucks Reserve Roastery in Shanghai.
• One Macy's employee told me: "They're ages ahead of us."