Technology
Examining the disruptive innovation of self-checkout
Retail Experience reached out to KanduAI CEO Ariel Shemesh to gain insight on where self check-out stands in retail today and where it'll be standing in the near future.
June 10, 2021 by Judy Mottl — Editor, RetailCustomerExperience.com & DigitalSignageToday.com
If you've ever gone the self-checkout route at the local grocery store with produce in your basket you likely have experienced a few blips in the scanning process or seen another customer struggling to get the scanner to read a crumpled wet label or attempt to find the specific apple being purchased on the digital screen.
Yet self-checkout is gaining ground, due in large part, at least in the past year of COVID-19, to consumers striving to avoid any form of in-person contact while shopping.
And as all who work in retail know, Amazon and several other leading technology innovators are busy deploying 'scan and go' store formats where the checkout line is literally eliminated.
Yet, for all the innovation and advancement, the self-checkout experience poses hurdles and challenges to retailers — from choosing a platform to encouraging shoppers to embrace the technology option.
To get perspective on hurdling those challenges as well as best practices on deployment, Retail Customer Experience reached out to Ariel Shemesh, CEO of KanduAI, a deep learning and computer vision expert. Shemesh invented an AI-based software for self-checkout kiosks in the grocery environment.
Q. Due to the pandemic obviously, but also consumer expectation, self checkout is front and center — yet some retailers likely are hesitant. What should retailers know before adopting self checkout, and what internally in terms of operations, training, etc. should they get in place?
A. First and foremost, self service does not mean no service, store associates will still provide service to shoppers both during checkout and more importantly be free to assist shoppers in the aisle during shopping. In order to succeed in a self checkout project it is important to understand your business goals and what are the KPIs you want to measure, if you can't measure it you can't improve it.
It is important to have all team members clear on the goals and the measurements as you plan the adoption of self checkout project From an operational perspective select a partner you trust to walk you through the process, it can be your existing POS vendor or other SCO vendor. I would not recommend switching a POS system just for the self checkout project, most self checkout systems integrate nicely with the existing POS system.
In order to calculate your ROI schedule it is important to understand the initial H/W and IT cost and the planned adoption rate , I would strongly recommend to evaluate cashless self checkout and how that would be perceived by your shoppers as cashless would have much lower operational cost. Last, but not least, adopting self checkout with computer vision built-in can allow a better user experience especially when it comes to produce without barcodes.
Q. What are the common challenges retailers face when embracing a self checkout strategy — is it getting internal support, getting funding?
A. The main challenge is actually not the strategy, everyone is already clear that SCO is a must and although every retailer is different the industry success measurements are pretty much the same. The challenges are with the execution, one of the main challenges is the team members perception that this move will cause significant layoffs. Management should assure team members that this move will actually help them serve better their clients during shopping and would not make them redundant. Another challenge we have seen is with the ability to decide on timing, there are always competing priorities and it is up to the senior management to define a deadline for the project to start.
Q. What should retailers do or not do in deploying self checkout — best practices to draw consumer adoption?
A. The best thing you can do to entice your shoppers to use the self checkout is to make it super simple and intuitive to use. Most shoppers want to use self checkout but because of the some time complex user experience they avoid using it. Make sure the user interface is intuitive and that there are no redundant steps during checkout. Add automatic recognition of none-barcoded items so the shoppers does not have to got through a tiresome product selection process. Make sure there is an option for remote assistance and that age verification for age restricted items is done automatically or at least aided by automation. Don't ask the shopper for any information which is not a must and make the process as frictionless as possible.
Q. Can you share insight on how a client/customer solved a challenge or issue?
A. The challenge our clients face before selecting to use our automatic produce recognition is that the user experience of produce selection is cumbersome and requires few steps to perform. For example, our solution enables a single click selection of fresh produce through computer vision which knows what is the item placed on the scanner scales of the self checkout machine
Q. As self checkout becomes more prevalent what next gen technology do you see for the retail grocery environment?
A. In the near future scan-and-go as well as smart carts will surely get more traction once the loss prevention pieces gets more mature and in the longer term frictionless checkout such as Amazon Go will become more mature and be able to support larger format stores. For express lanes (i.e 10 items or less) you would probably start seeing self checkout counters without a need for barcode scanning and the entire checkout will be done through AI cameras.
About Judy Mottl
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