The Future for Cashless and Checkout Free Stores
Our daily lives have become shaped by digital technologies. From social media to virtual reality, even our supermarket shopping experiences have transformed over the years: self-checkouts, contactless payments and now checkout free stores.
The idea of picking something up off the shelf and just walking out without physically paying seems crazy to some people, and that’s because it is. These checkout free stores rely on cameras and weight sensors to track what shoppers remove from the shelves, and what they put back. When they leave, they receive a virtual receipt to inform them that they have in fact paid for their items.
The pioneer of this concept was Amazon, opening their first Amazon Go store in Seattle in 2018, then supermarkets such as Tesco in the UK, Auchan in France, Netto Marken Discount in Germany and Whole Foods in the US swiftly followed. But what is the final aim? To create a quicker, easier and more seamless shopping experience for the consumer? Or is it just a business model which allows supermarkets to maximise profits by saving on staffing costs and to collect more data from their customers?
We can all agree that digital advancements in recent years have facilitated our daily lives but there are always disadvantages to such technologies. Some say that by removing the personnel from supermarkets we are damaging the economy due to the number of jobs lost. Furthermore, not everyone is ready for this next digital step forward, fearing that the future of consumption will be completely dehumanised. This type of store relies on consumers being technologically adept and owning a smartphone, leading to the exclusion of certain consumers who are technologically challenged.
It is interesting to note that at the same time, some consumers prefer a more interactive shopping experience where they can ‘chit chat’ with the cashier. To meet this expectation, supermarkets such as Syteme U and Auchan have introduced ‘blabla’ tills, with Carrefour introducing this concept to 150 stores across France in January 2022. Customers, therefore, have the choice between going to a ‘blabla’ checkout or a regular one. Since COVID-19 people are now valuing human connections more than ever in their daily lives. It’s important for the social aspect of society and it creates a concrete link between supermarkets and their consumers which is preferential to some people over striving for increased digitalisation.
The question remains: Will checkout free stores dramatically alter the future of bricks-and-mortar retail, or is it just a novelty to become obsolete in the next 5 years? For Amazon, it must be proving a success in the UK because after opening 15 stores London they are planning to open another 260 UK wide. However, for supermarkets such as Tesco and Sainsburys, they have decided to evaluate customer feedback before proceeding further after Sainsburys opened a checkout free store for 5 months in 2019 before reintroducing checkouts due to customer dissatisfaction.
It seems ideal for the consumer prioritising speed and efficiency, but checkout free stores were not designed with all consumers in mind. Moving forward, a hybrid store with the option of using a checkout OR walking straight out seems the best way to respond to all consumers’ needs. In any case, the future of supermarket checkouts remains a major topic for retailers and is yet to be defined.