It's been nearly a month since Amazon announced it was moving away from its no-checkout “Just Walk Out” technology, giving its main competitor, Berkeley, Calif.-based Grabango, an edge in the market. It has passed.
The technology company, which was incorporated in 2017, made headlines earlier this year when news outlets began reporting that it was partnering with German discount grocer Aldi on a pilot project at one of its stores in Aurora, Illinois. .
Before the Aldi deal, Grabango's two biggest customers were mass-market chains 7-Eleven and Circle K — Aldi is the company's first foray into the grocery world, said Will Glaser, Grabango's founder and CEO. Say this supermarket news Groceries have always been part of the business model.
Roughly two weeks after Amazon announced it would be scaling back its “Just Walk Out” technology in most of its stores, Grabango and Aldi have gone public about their Aurora trials.
“Aldi is one of the Chicago area grocery stores to launch ALDIgo, a checkout-free shopping experience powered by Grabango technology. Aldi is innovative and committed to providing shoppers with a best-in-class experience. “We are continually looking for new ways to do this, and this is an example of that in action,” an Aldi spokesperson said in an email. supermarket news.
In an interview with supermarket news In mid-April, Glaser could not provide details on whether the technology would be rolled out to other Aldi stores, but said the program had a high adoption rate among customers and the technology's implementation led to fewer stores. revealed that it had decreased. Location from November 2023.
And Aldi isn't the only grocery store Grabango works with, Glaser said.
Grocery stores have other customers, but Aldi is the only grocer that has been announced…'' He said Grabango is focused on big box stores. “Therefore, we do not have contracts with family businesses or stadiums with three outlets. We only work with very large organizations, mostly multinational companies.”
Since Amazon announced plans to focus on smart shopping carts rather than “Just Walk Out” technology, Glaser has publicly discussed the differences with Grabango's approach, which he believes is more cost-effective. , emphasized the ease of retrofitting existing stores such as Aldi in Aurora.
There are some similarities between Amazon and Grabango's technology. For example, both use video cameras placed throughout the store to film and tally shoppers' purchases as they shop. But that's mainly where the similarities end, according to Glazer.
He said the biggest difference is Amazon's reliance on shelf sensors that can tell when an item has been removed. Glaser said Grabango's technology relies primarily on computer vision.
According to Glazer, this difference led to Amazon's downfall. He said shelf sensors are not only expensive, but also difficult to retrofit into existing stores and difficult to change once the shelves are installed.
“This flexibility translates to high operating costs in addition to large hardware investments,” Glaser wrote in a recent blog post.
He said in an interview that Amazon's technology prevents grocery stores from carrying a wide variety of products that change frequently.
“There are no end caps because you can't move them. You can't run promotions or adjust how your products look. You can't do seasonal things either, so there's no Easter candy. There's no Easter candy on Memorial Day. “There's no flag. There's no flowers for Mother's Day,” he said. “It's all the same items every day. So when you walk in and look around, it looks like a grocery store and feels like a grocery store, but when you actually try to use it for your weekly shopping, for a variety of reasons, Something feels unsatisfying.”
By comparison, Grabango technology is designed to easily retrofit existing stores with little to no customer awareness. Once the system is in place, the only differences are a checkout kiosk at the front of the store where shoppers scan a QR code before leaving the store, and a discreet camera mounted on the ceiling.
No-checkout technology from Amazon and others has been in development for years, but if Aldi moves forward with Grabango, the U.S. market will get its first real taste of AI-powered shopping.
“My view is that change is coming very quickly to everything we now take for granted: email, smartphones, ATMs, Uber, text messaging,” he said. Told. “Soon checkout free will be everywhere, and I'll be able to talk to my kids better. I used to wait in line and strangers handled all my food,” she said. Did you know that the phone was tied to the wall?'' with a string. ”
