Imagine walking into a store, grab the stuff you want, skip the cashier and subsequently leave the store. With rapidly advancing technology, such as Artificial Intelligence (AI), Big Data, Internet of Things (IoT), and Machine Learning, this imagination has turned into reality. Biometric payment enables consumers to authorize payments through facial recognition (Jefferson, 2022). Instead of taking out cash or credit cards, consumers only need to get their face scanned at the check-out. In this way, queues are avoided, waiting time is eliminated, employee costs are reduced, while productivity is increased.
Amazon has been the first retailer to launch a cashierless store in 2018 (Oi, 2021). With the introduction of Amazon’s ‘Just Walk Out Shopping’, Amazon has initiated a new, technology-driven customer journey. Customers are required to registrate themselves in order to set up an Amazon account and are expected to have the free Amazon application downloaded on their mobile devices in advance. When entering an Amazon Go store, customers will be asked to enter the ‘In-Store Code’ within the application. Cameras detect products when these are taken by customers and automatically adds these products to a virtual chart (Amazon, n.d.). Although cashiers are no longer needed, employees are still present to help customers if they need to. After customers are done shopping, they can just walk out. The receipt will be sent to the Amazon account.
The technology is not limited to Amazon itself, as AiFi enables other stores to implement the same technology as Amazon. While Amazon focuses on providing a smooth customer journey and enhancing operational efficiency, AiFi aims to sell its product to third parties. AiFi is an American start-up that is specialized in the development of autonomous retail software. The start-up provides the same technology as Amazon’s ‘Just Walk Out Shopping’: cameras are everywhere to detect the movement of products. The virtual basket will be updated automatically whenever customers pick up products or when they put the products down (Dean, 2021). Remarkably, AiFi offers a hybrid payment method, enabling customers to either pay at a cashier if they want or else pay by biometric payment. As its global customer base is still growing, AiFi is expanding rapidly. The start-up even launched the largest autonomous store operated by cameras in Shanghai. With the expansion of AiFi, autonomous stores become more common.
Literature
Frequently Asked Questions. (n.d.). Amazon. Retrieved October 3, 2022, from https://www.amazon.com/b?ie=UTF8&node=16008589011
Jefferson, E. (2022, 14 September). Body talk: who’s ready for biometric verification?. Raconteur. Retreived October 3, 2022, from https://www.raconteur.net/finance/payments/body-talk-whos-ready-for-biometric-verification/
Oi, R. (2021, September 29). Post-pandemic, cashierless stores are now the present (not the future) of retail. TechHQ. Retrieved October 3, 2022, from https://techhq.com/2021/09/cashierless-stores/
The world’s biggest camera-operated autonomous store has opened in Shanghai. This is how it works. (2021, February 28). Business Insider Nederland. Retrieved October 3, 2022, from https://www.businessinsider.nl/the-worlds-biggest-camera-operated-autonomous-store-has-opened-in-shanghai-this-is-how-it-works/
Very interesting technology indeed! One question comes to my mind: is it really only cameras scanning the customers and detecting which products they put in their cart? Is it really possible for cameras to have a 100% success rate in scanning. Not only if they scan all articles, but also if they scan all articles correctly. I would really like to try walking around the store and see how the system reacts to certain movements!
This technology is very exciting, especially the way supermarkets will look and the interaction with customers. Currently the system uses cameras to detect the products that are chosen by the customers and Amazon links them to your Amazon account. I was wondering about this system and how it would work in the different chains of supermarkets, would you need separate accounts for every different brand of supermarkt in order for the system to work or would there be the possibility to have one account where all chains are linked to?
This technology is very exciting, especially considering how the way supermarkets currently look could change and the way the interaction takes plays with customers. As stated in the post, Amazon uses cameras to scan and see which products are taken by the consumer and adds these in the virtual card. Then the total amount is linked to the Amazon Account. AiFi makes this technology accessible to other supermarkets as well, but would the consumer then need a separate account for every different supermarkt chain or would there be a possibility to link all these supermarkets to one platform to make it easier for the consumer?
I heard about Amazon’s cashierless stores a while back and I was really intrigued. The overall idea is great, making groceries shopping much more efficient and solving the problem of forgetting your wallet or your card not being accepted by that particular store (i.e Albert Heijn not accepting many mastercards). A few questions come to mind when talking about this topic though:
– Is there any way to still keep your shopping data private? If we imagine a future with all store being cashierless and operated by cameras, we need to ensure that our grocery shopping habits can stay private in my opinion.
– If not as many employees are needed in-store anymore, how can we provide a new job to them? Technology will most likely make many jobs disappear – and new one appear -, but I believe it is important to put something in place to train people who were working those jobs so that they gain the required knowledge to adapt to the market.
Reading about this made me think that this technology could be applied to the public transport system in the Netherlands. Instead of having to scan their OV-chipkaart, people would just step in and step out and the system would register it. It would save a lot of time and improve the punctuality of the transports. It is probably too costly and complex to implement right now, but I could see it happen in the future.
Wow! What an interesting article. I have read about it in the past, but did not know it is already implemented by firms. I wonder if this will expand soon. I cannot picture how this would be in reality, even after watching the video. For instance, if it is very busy in the store or you took a product and put it back afterwards, will this technology be as accurate? Does it already face big challenges? I would like to know more about this fascinating topic!
Interesting article! Personally I am also interested in this topic, and I am about to write something about just-walk-outs little sister technology, smart baskets. I was wondering whether you think this technology will actually be widely adopted in the future. When writing my Bachelor thesis, I found that there is quite some resilience from customers regarding the privacy of these stores, specifically because giant Amazon is operating them and thus collecting all the data. I also think that the costs may be a problem for grocers, especially the smaller ones. However, I do think that this techology, or a similar one, will be widely adopted in the future.
Interesting article! Personally I am also interested in this topic, and I am about to write something about just-walk-outs little sister technology, smart baskets. I was wondering whether you think this technology will actually be widely adopted in the future. When writing my Bachelor thesis, I found that there is quite some resilience from customers regarding the privacy of these stores, specifically because giant Amazon is operating them and thus collecting all the data. I also think that the costs may be a problem for grocers, especially the smaller ones. However, I do think that this techology, or a similar one, will be widely adopted in the future.
You have written an interesting article that definitely triggers, well done! The video at the end is a nice added bonus that helps to understand the concept of automated shopping better. It is already common practice for supermarkets to have cameras. Nevertheless, a new challenge arises when supermarkets will start using enhanced computer vision (ecv) in their camera feed. Ecv enables to translate recordings into usable data. Given that these recordings are not only of the products, but also the consumer, the question arises what will happen to this newly created data? How will supermarkets ensure that this data is securely stored? Will customers be made aware what this data will be used for? And who does the data belong to? (customer or supermarket) I would be curious to hear your thoughts on this.