Amazon is completely changing course in its cashier-less stores: the AI cameras and sensors that made automatic checkout possible, are being replaced by RFID tags and smart shopping carts.
Not so automatic
Amazon’s decision can be called startling: for years, the retail giant had invested huge budgets in developing innovative systems that allowed customers in physical stores to take products off the shelves and walk out of the store without passing by the cash register. Checkout was automatic. At the launch of Amazon Go in late 2016, those frictionless systems were expected to shape the future of physical shopping.
In reality, the concept turned out to be far less advanced and automated than often thought. Amazon used an army of more than a thousand IT workers in India to assign purchases to the right customer and to train the AI system, in some ways acting like remote checkout staff. Moreover, the technology was too expensive and raised privacy concerns because of the sensitive information the retailer collected about its customers’ buying behaviour.
Smart carts
Going forward, Amazon will bet on Dash Carts, smart shopping carts with a built-in scanner. Products will be tagged with RFID tags, which have become much cheaper in recent years. Shoppers will still be able to checkout automatically with that system. For customers who do not use the Amazon app, there will be traditional self-scanning checkouts in stores. New stores will get Dash Carts, while existing stores will get rid of the technology, American website The Information reports. Amazon has already confirmed it to several media outlets.
It now remains to be seen if other retailers will come to similar conclusions. Chains like Aldi, Albert Heijn, Carrefour, Netto, Rewe and Tesco are all testing cashless stores with a similar technology. So far, those tests are not proving very convincing. Other retailers prefer self-service checkouts (despite the risk of fraud) and self-scanning apps or are betting – as Amazon is now doing – on RFID. Decathlon, for example, has been doing so for a while.
