November 21, 2024
Image Courtesy of Wegmans
Will Smart Shopping Carts Improve the Wegmans Shopping Experience?
Wegmans, which in 2022 discontinued its popular self-checkout app, is testing smart shopping carts at three stores in upstate New York as the technology appears to be gaining some traction.
“Smart Shopping Carts is an early-state technology that we believe could be offered to our customers as an alternative way to shop in our stores in the future,” Wegmans said in a statement to the Democrat & Chronicle. “Our goal is to determine if Smart Cart Technology is a fit for the unique shopping assortment offered in our stores and if it meets the shopping needs of our customers.”
The test comes after Wegmans pulled the plug on its SCAN self-checkout app in 2022 because thieves were exploiting the technology to walk out of stores without paying.
Smart shopping carts, which scan and weigh groceries as shoppers put items in their carts, promise to reduce theft attributed to self-scanning overall. Analysis shared last fall by cashierless checkout technology startup Grabango showed that losses due to self-checkout terminals amount to 3.5% of sales, more than 16 times greater than traditional cashiers.
The devices also promise to reduce the still-common scanning errors at self-checkout that often require associate assistance. Beyond scanning, smart shopping carts’ displays allow shoppers to track spending. The carts further sync with grocery stores’ loyalty accounts to give customers personalized discounts or even location-based promotions and add-along items based on what’s already in the shopper’s cart or what aisle the shopper is in.
Beyond marketing, smart shopping carts for retailers provide an opportunity to analyze customer movement patterns that can be used to optimize customer flow and product positioning.
Their potential in the grocery channel received a strong endorsement with Amazon’s move in April of this year to remove its “Just Walk Out” technology — which allows customers to shop and exit without going to a register — from Amazon Fresh, replacing it with its Dash Cart smart shopping carts.
Amazon told media outlets at the time that it “heard from customers that while they enjoyed the benefit of skipping the checkout line with Just Walk Out, they also wanted the ability to easily find nearby products and deals, view their receipt as they shop, and know how much money they saved while shopping throughout the store.”
Instacart in June expanded its Caper Cart technology to Price Chopper and McKeever’s Market & Eatery grocery stores, joining ongoing pilots at Kroger, ShopRite, Schnucks, and others. Instacart acquired Caper Cart in 2021.
“We made an early bet that smart carts would be the winning technology for transforming the in-store grocery experience because it’s a form factor people recognize and it doesn’t require retrofitting a whole store with large capex investments,” Instacart CEO Fidji Simo said in Instacart’s 2024 first-quarter shareholder letter. “Our Caper Carts do so much more than allow people to skip checkout.”
One con with the technology, according to Retail Technology Review, is the need for in-store storage, with the tech-driven carts more susceptible to weather damage than standard carts. Some smart carts arriving with clip-on devices may offer a solution. Other cited drawbacks include the high initial cost of the carts, potential privacy concerns, and the need for nearby associates to handle scanning and other issues.
BrainTrust
Ricardo Belmar
Retail Transformation Thought Leader, Advisor, & Strategist
Mohammad Ahsen
Co-Founder, Customer Maps
Brad Halverson
Principal, Clearbrand CX
Recent Discussions
Discussion Questions
Are American consumers ready to use smart carts to do their grocery shopping in big numbers?
What do you see as the opportunities and obstacles to adoption?
Poll
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Reducing the friction of checkout – whether self checkout or manned checkout – is beneficial. However, my view is that smart carts are an over-engineered, expensive solution for this. Grocers in the UK – like Tesco, Sainsbury’s and M&S – all use self scan technology. This is simpler and very effective.
Good point on the cost of the carts and technology. Maybe retailers can generate revenue from CPG companies for ads on the displays to help offset the cost of the carts. I thought that self-scanning on consumers’ mobile phones would be winning solution, however, retailers claim it resulted in too much theft.
Deployment of this technology will satisfy retailers’ desire to offer a differentiated experience. You need to remember – shoppers at grocery stores have an established pattern of behavior. For example, they typically are not at a grocery store for a few items. They typically allocated a large portion of time for their shopping experience (e.g. parking, shopping, wait time). They are largely mindful of what they plan to purchase. Carts do little to impact the majority of that experience. Further, I don’t believe consumers will shift their grocery shopping to Grocer A vs. Grocer B because of this innovation. There are other CAPEX to drive more measurable business outcomes.
If you keep asking a question that gets a resounding “no” will you eventually get a “yes” (and perhaps claim there’s some kind of change afoot)? Retailwire readers are participating in a live action test to find out; but for now this participant gives a thumbs down…again.
I have seen tests with these in the past, and consumers rejected them. Too many exceptions, cost prohibitive, and someone will find a way to trick this system eventually, like they did with self scan. I can’t see a smart cart surviving rain, snow or the hot blazing sun in the south. An expense no company would want to undertake.
Been here before. Consumers rejected it
I think I was first pitched this in the late 90s.
Stop N Shop piloted this in New England for more than 6 years . By the time it was finished they’d been through about 6 vendors. According to Steve, who still lived there, no one used them
Smart-carts aren’t quite yet seen as a really valuable and reliable experience, but I believe they ultimately provide a better solution in the long-run, especially for larger basket shopping than scanning with a mobile phone, or using self-checkout. For a quick shop of under 10 items, self-check works great. But the larger basket shop includes more decision making, holds more potential upside for product education and will benefit the customer in having more tech feature sets to help them buy the right solution or save time. And heading toward the door, if the customer knows with a smart cart they are also saving another 3-7 minutes by not being in a checkout line, it makes the decision easy.
American consumers value convenience but dislike over-engineering; smart carts must be easy, reliable, and enhance shopping without complicating it. Opportunities include faster checkout, personalized discounts, better spending tracking, improved store navigation, and loyalty integration. Obstacles include high costs, tech reliability, privacy concerns, and learning curves.
Agreed, Mohammad. The real opportunity lies in simplifying the technology to genuinely enhance the shopping experience without overcomplicating it.
The concept of a smart cart is great and it’s not hard to list many advantages for both the consumer and the retailer. Perhaps the biggest challenge is in reliability and cost. Let’s face the elephant in the room – when you go to the grocery store, how often to you see shopping carts in pristine condition? How often do you grab a cart and realize, yes, you’ve got the one with the broken wheel that spins in every direction except the one you want to go? Shopping carts are notoriously banged around and beaten down. Smart carts are very advanced pieces of tech. These two things are very hard to reconcile. It wil be interesting to see how all of these deployments proceed and how often retailers need to refresh and repair the technology to keep them running.
It always comes down to the math, doesn’t it? Accounting for cart refresh and repair is real and should be an embedded line item. Grocers will want to understand, does this new line item cost justify itself against the sales/profit upside of going deeper with the customer via tech, and applying any cost savings like labor, etc. Do the believe the math works?
There are countless benefits to the consumer with SmartCart technology, and I am confident that they will embrace the technology here as they have begun to do in Asia.
In addition to helping shoppers with a rapid checkout experience, the technology can help locate a specific product location, recommend products based on prior purchases, provide a platform for in-store Retail Media, and work in partnership with ESL technology to highlight a specific product on the shelf.
Smart carts continue to be a hammer looking for a nail in my opinion. Will they become common? Probably, but not because the consumer sees much value in them, but because the grocers like the idea of another way to market to customers and to reduce headcount at the front end. The problem is, as Neil points out, these things tend to be overengineered, which also makes them really expensive to roll out. Plus the maintenance of keeping these things working properly… given the hard life shopping carts live in stores and parking lots.. Not to mention, the customer’s smartphone can perform all of the functions of a smart cart, except carrying groceries with zero hardware investment from the retailers. Retailers: there are better places to invest in innovation.
Interesting idea in theory, but……it probably costs too much, might require periodic maintenance, susceptible to damage from rain, too complicated for most folks who just want to buy quality products at a fair price and get out of the store.
Smart Shopping Carts present great potential for brands and consumers, but maximizing those opportunities will take considerable forethought and careful execution. Like any major technology shift, it will take time to change the long-held habits of consumers. But, the opportunity for consumer insights is well worth it.
In terms of opportunity, advertising potential is number one. There’s no better time to get in front of customers than when they actively shop where your product is. Regarding challenges, friction with technology will be the largest one to navigate. Grocers and smart cart providers must consider every aspect of the shopping experience. What happens if someone wants to put something back? How do you handle kids throwing snacks in, etc?
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Reducing the friction of checkout – whether self checkout or manned checkout – is beneficial. However, my view is that smart carts are an over-engineered, expensive solution for this. Grocers in the UK – like Tesco, Sainsbury’s and M&S – all use self scan technology. This is simpler and very effective.
Good point on the cost of the carts and technology. Maybe retailers can generate revenue from CPG companies for ads on the displays to help offset the cost of the carts. I thought that self-scanning on consumers’ mobile phones would be winning solution, however, retailers claim it resulted in too much theft.
Deployment of this technology will satisfy retailers’ desire to offer a differentiated experience. You need to remember – shoppers at grocery stores have an established pattern of behavior. For example, they typically are not at a grocery store for a few items. They typically allocated a large portion of time for their shopping experience (e.g. parking, shopping, wait time). They are largely mindful of what they plan to purchase. Carts do little to impact the majority of that experience. Further, I don’t believe consumers will shift their grocery shopping to Grocer A vs. Grocer B because of this innovation. There are other CAPEX to drive more measurable business outcomes.
If you keep asking a question that gets a resounding “no” will you eventually get a “yes” (and perhaps claim there’s some kind of change afoot)? Retailwire readers are participating in a live action test to find out; but for now this participant gives a thumbs down…again.
I have seen tests with these in the past, and consumers rejected them. Too many exceptions, cost prohibitive, and someone will find a way to trick this system eventually, like they did with self scan. I can’t see a smart cart surviving rain, snow or the hot blazing sun in the south. An expense no company would want to undertake.
Been here before. Consumers rejected it
I think I was first pitched this in the late 90s.
Stop N Shop piloted this in New England for more than 6 years . By the time it was finished they’d been through about 6 vendors. According to Steve, who still lived there, no one used them
Smart-carts aren’t quite yet seen as a really valuable and reliable experience, but I believe they ultimately provide a better solution in the long-run, especially for larger basket shopping than scanning with a mobile phone, or using self-checkout. For a quick shop of under 10 items, self-check works great. But the larger basket shop includes more decision making, holds more potential upside for product education and will benefit the customer in having more tech feature sets to help them buy the right solution or save time. And heading toward the door, if the customer knows with a smart cart they are also saving another 3-7 minutes by not being in a checkout line, it makes the decision easy.
American consumers value convenience but dislike over-engineering; smart carts must be easy, reliable, and enhance shopping without complicating it. Opportunities include faster checkout, personalized discounts, better spending tracking, improved store navigation, and loyalty integration. Obstacles include high costs, tech reliability, privacy concerns, and learning curves.
Agreed, Mohammad. The real opportunity lies in simplifying the technology to genuinely enhance the shopping experience without overcomplicating it.
The concept of a smart cart is great and it’s not hard to list many advantages for both the consumer and the retailer. Perhaps the biggest challenge is in reliability and cost. Let’s face the elephant in the room – when you go to the grocery store, how often to you see shopping carts in pristine condition? How often do you grab a cart and realize, yes, you’ve got the one with the broken wheel that spins in every direction except the one you want to go? Shopping carts are notoriously banged around and beaten down. Smart carts are very advanced pieces of tech. These two things are very hard to reconcile. It wil be interesting to see how all of these deployments proceed and how often retailers need to refresh and repair the technology to keep them running.
It always comes down to the math, doesn’t it? Accounting for cart refresh and repair is real and should be an embedded line item. Grocers will want to understand, does this new line item cost justify itself against the sales/profit upside of going deeper with the customer via tech, and applying any cost savings like labor, etc. Do the believe the math works?
There are countless benefits to the consumer with SmartCart technology, and I am confident that they will embrace the technology here as they have begun to do in Asia.
In addition to helping shoppers with a rapid checkout experience, the technology can help locate a specific product location, recommend products based on prior purchases, provide a platform for in-store Retail Media, and work in partnership with ESL technology to highlight a specific product on the shelf.
Smart carts continue to be a hammer looking for a nail in my opinion. Will they become common? Probably, but not because the consumer sees much value in them, but because the grocers like the idea of another way to market to customers and to reduce headcount at the front end. The problem is, as Neil points out, these things tend to be overengineered, which also makes them really expensive to roll out. Plus the maintenance of keeping these things working properly… given the hard life shopping carts live in stores and parking lots.. Not to mention, the customer’s smartphone can perform all of the functions of a smart cart, except carrying groceries with zero hardware investment from the retailers. Retailers: there are better places to invest in innovation.
Interesting idea in theory, but……it probably costs too much, might require periodic maintenance, susceptible to damage from rain, too complicated for most folks who just want to buy quality products at a fair price and get out of the store.
Smart Shopping Carts present great potential for brands and consumers, but maximizing those opportunities will take considerable forethought and careful execution. Like any major technology shift, it will take time to change the long-held habits of consumers. But, the opportunity for consumer insights is well worth it.
In terms of opportunity, advertising potential is number one. There’s no better time to get in front of customers than when they actively shop where your product is. Regarding challenges, friction with technology will be the largest one to navigate. Grocers and smart cart providers must consider every aspect of the shopping experience. What happens if someone wants to put something back? How do you handle kids throwing snacks in, etc?