China’s Tech Giants Are Cloning the Apple Store

In September, Chinese drone maker DJI opened a flagship store in Hong Kong’s trendy Causeway Bay neighborhood. On the first floor, in an area cordoned off with black netting, like a batting cage, customers test the machines in flight. The second floor resembles a museum, the walls decorated with framed aerial drone photos of a bamboo forest in Kyoto, Japan; white waves trailing a ship near the Philippines; farm equipment combing fields in the Netherlands. The third floor houses a repair station, where on a recent Wednesday afternoon, three people stood in line waiting for advice.

Selling in its own stores in China is new for 10-year-old DJI. While the Shenzhen company is the world’s leading seller of consumer drones, it is, unlike most Chinese tech businesses, more popular elsewhere. About 80 percent of sales come from abroad, more than half from the U.S., where hobbyist interest had been cultivated by decades’ worth of radio-controlled helicopters and other toys.