• by Steve Smith , Staff Writer @popeyesm, January 7, 2014

Apple's iBeacon Bluetooth LTE platform is the talk of the in-store crowd this season. Furthering the trend, shopping app developer inMarket announced this week that it is bringing its in-store iBeacon solution to 150 grocery outlets in coming weeks. The Giant Eagle and Safeway stores in Cleveland, Seattle and San Francisco will be among the first to see these proximity wireless sensors installed. The inMarket model leverages the company's existing popular shopping apps like CheckPoints to communicate with visitors in the store itself.

Dubbed “Mobile to Mortar,” the program can be used to give in-store directions and offers associated with the shopping list and rewards apps that inMarket says have been downloaded by over 20 million users.

In coverage at Apple Insider, inMarket CEO Todd DiPaola touted the iBeacon Bluetooth LTE technology as superior to NFC. "NFC requires users to literally take their phone out, turn it on, and tap it against a target to activate," DiPaola said. "iBeacons can reach a user with their phone in their pocket anywhere in a store. This allows shoppers to physically browse the store as normal and take advantage of new features like a shopping list reminder when they enter. Mobile to Mortar will be compatible with all BLE devices including Android."

With enough sensors installed at a location, iBeacons could communicate with consumers at precisely targeted locations. For now, however, inMarket's program is addressing the shopper as she enters the store.

The wave of announcements around iBeacons suggests that Apple still has some industry mojo left. There have been a number of in-store mobile notification technologies available before now, many of them involving WiFi and previous Bluetooth implementations. The introduction of iBeacon technology sensors and integration with iOS 7 seems to have accelerated interest in proximity marketing in-venue. At this week's CES event in Las Vegas, iBeacons are being used for a scavenger hunt.