Do you remember when supermarkets still had in-store butchers and bakers? Over time a lot of supermarkets are evolving, adding and subtracting characteristics. Whereas in-store butchers and bakers are no longer a certainty when visiting a supermarket, “to-go” items, fresh products and meals under the name ‘deli’, and superfoods are included in the usual assortment now. And whereas people would get all their groceries for a whole week and would get their more than packed shopping carts in a long queue, this process is now disrupted by online orders, self-serve scanning and checkout-less shopping. This makes us wonder, what else will change to grocery shopping as we know it now? Will supermarkets in a physical form even exist in the future?
Big experiments like Amazon Go, a supermarket without shopping carts and cashiers, are already happening. But according to Brewer et al. (2018) “retailers shouldn’t rush to rip out their registers just yet. Retail is littered with promising technologies introduced with great fanfare that didn’t become mainstream because they didn’t sufficiently benefit either the retailer or the customer.” Retail industry experts interviewed by the Guardian all agree that the way physical stores operate and serve their customers will change, implementing several new technologies that will make shopping more convenient and personal. What they do not see happening, is physical stores disappearing forever (the Guardian, 2017).
What can we expect for the nearby future? The overarching theme will be personalization. By using artificial intelligence and augmented reality supermarkets will be able to track and target shoppers, trying to tempt them with specials. This means you can get a push notification on your phone with an offer for your favorite yoghurt, when you are walking through the diary aisle. When augmented reality will be implemented, the (personal) offers would pop up on your phone camera screen as you are walking through the supermarket (The new daily, 2019).
Brewer, D., Faigen, G., & Harrison, N. (2018). Why amazon’s grocery store may not be the future of retail. Harvard Business School Cases, Feb 01, 2018, P1
“The Guardian” (2017) Accessed on 25 September 2019 on https://www.theguardian.com/media-network/2017/jan/25/what-store-future-look-like-retail-technology
“The new daily” (2019) Accessed on 25 September 2019 on https://thenewdaily.com.au/life/tech/2019/06/20/supermarket-future-changes-technology/
Hi Kim!
Great post, an interesting insight. I completely agree with you, the supermarkets will be evolving, but I’m just wondering which direction that would be. When I think about being in the supermarket, and I would get notifications of the products I’m currently looking at, I would get kinda freaked out and feel like i’m being watched. But I still understand the need for personalisation, i’m just thinking it would be more in the direction of online advertisement. For example, email adverts. Or when online shopping, they could suggest discounts that I would be interested in. I would say that supermarkets will become obsolete soon, and people will just buy their groceries online because the world is getting busier and busier.
What do you think, would you be comfortable in a supermarket if the market would recommend you stuff while you stroll around?
Hi Kim,
Interesting to see how different technologies are disrupting supermarkets in the future. I am very curious to see the first versions of these technologies in my supermarket. However, how do you feel about the way other companies are disrupting the market? For example HelloFresh, which is a meal plan delivery firm, is responsible for customers changing their shopping behavior at supermarkets. With the ease of HelloFresh people do not have to think about their daily dinner recipes and instead get a box delivered with meal plans and ingredients for the whole week. How do you think this will impact the supermarkets of the future? Will they try to compete and offer the same meal plan deliveries? Or will they keep their own marketing strategy taking the loss of customers which are drawn away by companies as HelloFresh?