Amazon Fresh: Just Walk Out

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Alpha8472
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Amazon Fresh: Just Walk Out

Post by Alpha8472 »

A new Amazon Fresh store opens up in Bellevue, Washington June 17 featuring the new Just Walk Out system. The new cashierless technology will track what you pick up and you will not need to visit a checkout to pay. Other customers who do not want to use Just Walk Out will still have to stop and pay at the cash registers.

This might work in some places, but imagine this format in a high crime area.

Just Walk Out... I am sure there are plenty of people who will say, "Don't mind if I do."

https://www.supermarketnews.com/technol ... azon-fresh
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Re: Amazon Fresh: Just Walk Out

Post by rwsandiego »

I'm sure this would work out just great in downtown Seattle - for the shoplifters.

But seriously, this is about testing the technology in advance of selling it to retailers. Not sure who would buy it. Maybe convenience stores in office parks?
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Re: Amazon Fresh: Just Walk Out

Post by storewanderer »

But this pressures other retailers to put time and money into a "just walk out" technology too because if Amazon is doing it, Wall Street will say other retailers need to do it too or they will be left behind.

I personally have no interest in a "just walk out" shopping experience anyway. I want to verify I am being charged correctly for my purchase.
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Re: Amazon Fresh: Just Walk Out

Post by Brian Lutz »

There are a couple of Amazon Go stores in Downtown Seattle, although I don't know how well those work for them. In theory you would not be allowed to enter the store without checking in at the door, but I would assume someone could jump the gate pretty easily.
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Re: Amazon Fresh: Just Walk Out

Post by babs »

rwsandiego wrote: June 16th, 2021, 8:36 pm I'm sure this would work out just great in downtown Seattle - for the shoplifters.

But seriously, this is about testing the technology in advance of selling it to retailers. Not sure who would buy it. Maybe convenience stores in office parks?
It's being used in airports:
https://www.hudsongroup.com/press_relea ... t-walk-out
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Re: Amazon Fresh: Just Walk Out

Post by rwsandiego »

babs wrote: June 17th, 2021, 7:36 pm
rwsandiego wrote: June 16th, 2021, 8:36 pm I'm sure this would work out just great in downtown Seattle - for the shoplifters.

But seriously, this is about testing the technology in advance of selling it to retailers. Not sure who would buy it. Maybe convenience stores in office parks?
It's being used in airports:
https://www.hudsongroup.com/press_relea ... t-walk-out
That's another good application of the technology. You typically do not have a lot of shoplifters at an airport.
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Re: Amazon Fresh: Just Walk Out

Post by Alpha8472 »

Airport stores generally have little theft inside the security checkpoint. However, outside the security perimeter they let anyone in. That is why many people steal luggage at the baggage claim. You see many homeless people with brand new rolling luggage. The baggage claim is wide open.
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Re: Amazon Fresh: Just Walk Out

Post by storewanderer »

rwsandiego wrote: June 17th, 2021, 8:14 pm
That's another good application of the technology. You typically do not have a lot of shoplifters at an airport.
You would think with all the cameras around and the fact that every airport has a dedicated police unit among other security that there would not be much theft in airports but I have been told in some airports there actually is a good amount of theft of the snack foods, medicine, chargers/power banks, and other items that can easily be pocketed. Also that everyone goes in with multiple bags/luggage makes these stores more vulnerable. This is baked into the pricing structure at these places along with the other various higher costs involved with doing business in an airport. Between the heavy crowds, small store sizes, and surges in business (so employees need to get customers through and aren't necessarily paying attention to the exit) certain airports and on certain days/times actually do experience enough shoplifting that it makes a difference. This is one of the factors in why pricing on stuff varies so much from one airport to another. Also why it is not unusual to see certain chargers, power banks, etc. locked up in the airport shops.

The "just walk out" may actually free up staff to better monitor what is going on in the airport shops...
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Re: Amazon Fresh: Just Walk Out

Post by ClownLoach »

storewanderer wrote: June 16th, 2021, 9:13 pm But this pressures other retailers to put time and money into a "just walk out" technology too because if Amazon is doing it, Wall Street will say other retailers need to do it too or they will be left behind.

I personally have no interest in a "just walk out" shopping experience anyway. I want to verify I am being charged correctly for my purchase.
You're 100% right, I think this is another Trojan Horse project. Wall Street truly does not understand retail. The more publicly exposed the company is the worse off they seem to be (and that includes chains owned by private equity firms). Wall Street dictates that they must go out and find ways to compete with this new Amazon initiative, and if they don't then they will be appropriately punished when their stock price crashes. Just like all these online order pickup and delivery programs that are massive money losers. They distract from running the business properly. Wall Street will mandate that the Kroger and Albertson's of the world must start finding ways to install shelves with scales, 10,000 cameras and all the computing power they need to understand that you are holding a can of beans, and security gates from an office building that have been enlarged to block a shopping cart. Amazon has the cloud computing power (developed at the expense of their customers) to scan all those cameras, and again buy simple office security gates and subway turnstiles for one or two stores. And can you imagine if Wall Street gets a chain to actually buy this tech from Amazon? They will never give up the rights to information and will data mine them out of business just like when they were signed up to provide e-commerce services for Toys R Us and Circuit City. Once both were on their death beds they realized that Amazon had bled them dry.

I equate all of this to the cell phone wars, which were not even won by someone going out and making the best possible product. Apple started placing "vaporware" rumors in the marketplace of an upcoming WATCH, and supposedly it would be a generational product with life changing abilities. All the cell phone companies started spending billions trying to develop their new watch products to beat Apple to market, canceling their R&D on phones. Supposedly this fantastical watch was going to be so otherworldly in its powers that phones wouldn't matter anyway. They were compelled by Wall Street to beat Apple at all costs and own the watch market. And what happened? Most of them were knocked out of both businesses before Apple even had a product to sell. Consumers bought all of these tacky tech watches that didn't even work well. Innovation really went out of the phone side of things and Apple gained near monopoly power as everyone except Samsung went broke (and the only reason Samsung really survived was that they were selling both screens and chips to Apple to make their phones which gave them the cash to stay in the market). Yes eventually Apple released a watch about 5 years after the rumors started and it was a cute phone accessory, but by the time they did they had a stranglehold on the phone market itself. And now we are finally just starting to see some new phones be developed with different designs like folding screens that bring back the clamshell format, but we have had a lost decade worldwide in innovation as let's face it every phone has been a rectangular pane of glass.

This is how Amazon will find ways to quietly expand their grocery business. They don't have to be the best at it. They just have to keep growing it while everyone else flails around bankrupting themselves running up debt to compete with these "innovations."
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Re: Amazon Fresh: Just Walk Out

Post by Bagels »

Sounds exactly like the “dash carts” already in place at existing stores...
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