The “Just Walk Out” Trend
Frictionless, unattended or Just Walk Out? Well, even with a lack of consensus about the description, this trend appears established and highly significant.
London is fast becoming one of the focus points for Amazon with new Fresh stores opening every few weeks. Tesco’s “GetGo” version has also been trading successfully in Central London for a number of months and, according to Bloomberg, Sainsbury’s will be one of the first to licence Amazon’s camera-based shopping system in the UK in one of their Local format stores. It will be branded “SmartShop Pick & Go” we understand and actually located quite near the new Tesco store.
Not to be outdone, other retailers are getting in on the act. In France Carrefour opened its first frictionless store in Paris last week. The new concept is called Flash 10/10: 10 seconds to shop, 10- seconds to pay and sounds very impressive.
According to Maxime Delacour at the IGD, the store is powered by AiFi Inc. enabling anonymous recognition and tracking of shoppers thanks to the 60 cameras located in the store. This is combined with smart shelves which weigh products to ensure accuracy. Interestingly, unlike the Amazon and Tesco stores, Flash 10/10 doesn’t have gates or require customers to use an app, it’s open to everyone to walk in and walk out.
One big question we have been asked recently is whether this technology can be used in a forecourt environment. We have heard of numerous roadside retailers trialling this technology in their forecourt sites. Noteworthy in this regard is that fact that ADNOC Distribution have just announced and successfully launched a pilot site in an office complex in Abu Dhabi. This is their new innovation under the ADNOC Oasis banner.
Given that Amazon has already opened 25,000 square foot stores with Just Walk Out capability in the US, it would appear that larger store footprints may well be suitable for this innovation too.
According to Amazon’s Vice President of Physical Retail and Technology Dilip Kumar: “Bringing Just Walk Out technology to a full size grocery space with the Amazon Fresh store in Bellevue showcases the technology’s continued ability to scale and adapt to new environments and selection”.
Interesting times in retail and given labour shortages and the continued massive appeal of frictionless transactions to customer, this looks set to grow and grow.
