Amazon Is Now Selling Its Cashierless Store Tech To Other Retailers (techcrunch.com) 65
Amazon is now offering its "Just Walk Out" technology to other retailers. "The technology uses a combination of cameras, sensors, computer vision techniques and deep learning to allow customers to shop, then leave the store without waiting in line to pay," reports TechCrunch. It's the same tech that Amazon uses in its "Go" cashierless convenience stores and Amazon's newly launched Amazon Go Grocery store in Seattle. From the report: Reuters first reported the news just ahead of Amazon's official announcement, adding also that Amazon says it has signed "several" deals with initial customers interested in using Just Walk Out in their own stores. Amazon did not say who those customers are, however. Amazon has also now launched a website detailing how Just Walk Out works, and answering several questions about this new business line.
The website says that other retailers have expressed interest in the tech for years, which is why it decided to start offering Just Walk Out for sale. The system Amazon is offering includes "all the necessary technology to enable checkout-free shopping," the site notes. That would mean Amazon is providing the camera hardware and sensor technology, in addition to the software systems. The site doesn't mention pricing, but says the system also comes with 24/7 support via phone and email. The setup and installation of the system can take as little as a few weeks once Amazon has access to the retailer's store, Amazon says. For new builds, Amazon can work with the retailer to integrate Just Walk Out during the construction phase or it can do the same as a store undergoes remodels. It also can try to install the technology to an existing store with minimal disruption to customers.
The website says that other retailers have expressed interest in the tech for years, which is why it decided to start offering Just Walk Out for sale. The system Amazon is offering includes "all the necessary technology to enable checkout-free shopping," the site notes. That would mean Amazon is providing the camera hardware and sensor technology, in addition to the software systems. The site doesn't mention pricing, but says the system also comes with 24/7 support via phone and email. The setup and installation of the system can take as little as a few weeks once Amazon has access to the retailer's store, Amazon says. For new builds, Amazon can work with the retailer to integrate Just Walk Out during the construction phase or it can do the same as a store undergoes remodels. It also can try to install the technology to an existing store with minimal disruption to customers.
Finally! No human contact!! (Score:3)
No I can avoid person to person contact for nearly everything I do.
Order lunch at McDonald's via terminal? Check
Order starbucks from App? Check
Order clothes and good online? Check
Pay for gas? Check
And now finally, the last piece of the puzzle that enables me to avoid all human contact when venturing out of the basement!! Amazing news.
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C'mon, you could order pretty much everything to your doorstep already. Plus, since the delivery people rarely if ever work the 10 seconds it takes you to get to the door before they fake your signature and bail, there is practically no human contact required whatsoever.
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I already don't deal with people for my grocery shopping. Here in Montreal, I can get fresh veggies, eggs and milk delivered for a $5 delivery fee. I just leave my old delivery box out and they swap it for a full one and ring my doorbell.
It was a lifestyle change I made a few months ago when there was a predicted snow storm and people went on a massive panic buy leaving my usual grocery store with no carts and a 45 minute line for the checkout.
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"And now finally, the last piece of the puzzle that enables me to avoid all human contact when venturing out of the basement!! Amazing news."
Indeed, that's what every doctor and health official tells us right now.
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On top of that, people are growing more and more miserable every day and I just don't want to deal with it. Every
Re: Finally! No human contact!! (Score:2)
I get everything your saying, but the just-short-of body cavity search just to leave the store from a cashierless venue takes all that away. Guilty until proven innocent. You are already a thief, you just dont know it yet.
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Re:Finally! No human contact!! (Score:4, Insightful)
...On top of that, people are growing more and more miserable every day and I just don't want to deal with it. Every time I attempt to strike up a conversation with a waiter/ess, it goes nowhere. The art of conversation is done for in the vast majority of every day transactions
Yeah, ever wonder why the Art of Conversation, gets shittier with each and every generation that doesn't want to "deal" with their fellow humans?
Needless to say, practice is key.
Don't know why we would even call it a lifestyle when the end goal is to remove all life. Hope misery enjoys the company of machines instead of humans, because that's the "utopia" society is practically demanding.
And if the Art of Conversation sucks for you seemingly every time, then maybe it is you that needs to practice more.
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For McDonalds terminals. You now have people delivering your food to you. In actuality With These Terminals McDonalds has been hiring additional people so they can have people deliver food to your table. Able to assist people using the terminal, cover the counter for the people who don't use the terminal.
Starbucks App, someone still hands you the coffee, and will chat with you.
Gas and online orders yes less human contact. However with perhaps the exception of clothing these had minimal human contact any
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And now finally, the last piece of the puzzle that enables me to avoid all human contact when venturing out of the basement!! Amazing news.
Sadly we still have to comb the pringles out of our beard when the cable guy comes over.
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It's hilarious to me that there are McDonald's ordering kiosks literally 3 steps away from cashiers.
The last time I was in a McDonald's, I stepped through the door, saw a bunch of people ordering at kiosks and nobody at the cashiers.... I walked up to an open cashier, placed my order and had my food before the people at the kiosks were done.... I can't even understand the mentality even now.
As for the cashierless store... I would at least wait until all of Whole Foods stores are running with it before think
Once this takes off, no more Amazon Go? (Score:1)
Re:Once this takes off, no more Amazon Go? (Score:4, Interesting)
Yes this has been the plan all a long. I have said it before https://slashdot.org/comments.... [slashdot.org].
This is a twist on embrace extend extinguish. My work takes me inside a lots of nation wide retailers and the one constant with all of them is they are outsourcing everything they can. One thing management is *right* about is their survival depends on their ability to rapidly scale up and down. That means the ability to do things like open new stores when the market is going up and consumers feel like they have money to spend, the ability to close badly performing stores, and change the number of stores it takes to have store'd the country. What I don't know is if they see the bigger picture and if there is really anything they can do about it.
All the real-estate is leased, inventory levels are minimal at distribution centers, as near to just in time as they know how to be, more and more they are experimenting with caring product on consignment.
The IT plant has not been exempt. Its been mostly lift-and-shift to the cloud because changing store and warehouse systems means re-training lots of people. However now that Amazon already is running your stuff, its simpler argument to say hey you know you can just replace all that with this weeks exciting new AWS service offering.. Its even easier if you can say don't worry about re-training people we can replace most of them too!
Step three will Amazon makes the argument hey we are better at moving product around the country than you are and our distribution facilities are cheaper to run than yours - we already manage all your inventory and demand information let us stock your stores for you.
Finally Amazon just offers to buy them out for the name to hold on to the senior and boomer segment that wants to shop at Winford Lauder because they always have. Amazon can do this easily because the few employees left are the ones who were ready trained to manage amazons e-store tech stack. Gradually Amazon allows the customer to see their own branding more and more often eventually the old name comes off the mast head.
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Yes - everything you describe above is the business equivalent of living paycheck to paycheck, yet it's lauded as smart.
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I also expect there is also some other legal issues going on, such as many States forcing companies to accept cash for their goods and services. This rule would put a damper on Amazon Go Coolness factor. Of walking in the store picking up your items and leaving. Where it will need someone to handle cash. It would be like all Cellphone makers should have a hot swap battery now. So all their seamless phones will need to be altered with bulky replaceable battery packs. They will still work but just be less
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Unrealistic. (Score:2)
Far too nice for Amazon's style.
That is not how they roll on planet Bezos.
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"Please install this spyware in your store, so I can collect all your data and push you out of business, so we can take over."
Take a look at the ceiling, there are already dozens of cameras there, those were not installed by the fat shop detective.
Don't forget to show your customer card on the way out so that they can attribute the stuff you buy also when paying cash.
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He is not talking about Amazon spying you the consumer - not directly anyway. He is talking about amazon spying on the shop it self (their customer) so they can ultimately leverage that information to push them out of the market and take their market share for themselves.
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Please install this spyware in your store, so I can collect all your data and push you out of business, so we can take over.
Amazons response to this is simple, and straight to the point.
Consider yourself lucky that you still have a business need to install our spyware.
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Wrong profit motive. You can make more money selling the licenses then using the licenses. Amazon first had to demonstrate the viability of the technology. One small store at their headquarters generated millions in free publicity / advertising.
Once this is done then they can extend their product into stores that do not even compete with them. Retailers have very low profit margins. They will pursue this for the same reasons they have pursued self checkout lanes - headcount reduction.
Amazon Now gets a slice
Creepy As Fuck. (Score:2)
I'd suggest "Just Never Walk In".
Seriously, how are the people who come up with this shit not locked up in a dangerous psychopath ward of a mental hospital? They need medical help!
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Not only that, but there's a lot of low-qualification workers who relied on cashier jobs to make ends meet, who are going to go hungry. Or more accurately, they'll go on the dole, meaning they'll go hungry AND the taxpayer will foot the bill to subsidize their existence.
So, everybody loses - the taxpayer who pays more taxes, the state that has more unemployment to deal with, the unemployed who'd rather have a job - and Amazon wins a shitload of money on everybody's backs.
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there's a lot of low-qualification workers who relied on cashier jobs to make ends meet
Automation has been eliminating repetitive jobs since the invention of the steam engine 300 years ago. Yet incomes have increased 20-fold and we have a full-employment economy.
If your theory that "automation causes poverty" was correct, then America, Europe, and East Asia would be impoverished, while countries that avoided the "productivity catastrophe" such as Ethiopia, Afghanistan, and Mozambique, would be rich and prosperous. Yet reality is exactly the opposite.
The economy is not zero-sum and jobs don'
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there's a lot of low-qualification workers who relied on cashier jobs to make ends meet
Automation has been eliminating repetitive jobs since the invention of the steam engine 300 years ago. Yet incomes have increased 20-fold and we have a full-employment economy.
First off, stop trying to compare yesteryears automation to this latest wave. Much like 21st Century feminism, it looks nothing like the predecessors, and will impact our modern society differently than it did 200 years ago. A simple GPS service outage would affect our modern society in a rather drastic way.
Secondly, stop merely dismissing the real pains brought on by every revolution we've ever gone through, as if thousands weren't pushed out to pasture when buggy whips and steam engines became obsolete.
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First off, stop trying to compare yesteryears automation to this latest wave.
What is the difference between the elimination of cashiers today and the elimination of bank tellers a generation ago? Or the elimination of switchboard operators a generation before that?
It is the same phenomenon with the same result. Tasks are automated and workers are redeployed in more productive jobs.
it looks nothing like the predecessors
Because now we have ultra-dextrous robots with super-human intelligence?
Guess what? We don't.
and will impact our modern society differently than it did 200 years ago.
That may happen someday. But it isn't happening now.
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First off, stop trying to compare yesteryears automation to this latest wave.
What is the difference between the elimination of cashiers today and the elimination of bank tellers a generation ago? Or the elimination of switchboard operators a generation before that?
Uh, we didn't eliminate bank tellers. That job still exists today, and there's plenty of physical banks around, and I certainly have plenty of memories of standing in bank lines waiting for tellers in the 21st Century. They're damn near as prevalent as coffee shops in my city. And switchboard operator was actually a rather skilled profession which translates to re-trainable, unlike the 10% of society armed with an 80's level IQ that struggles to even spell "multi-tasking", much less actually perform it.
It is the same phenomenon with the same result. Tasks are automated and workers are redeployed in more productive jobs.
It
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The answer is money.
The old saying if you are poor you are Crazy if you are rich you are Eccentric.
That said, I prefer the monitoring of the AI Electronic Eye over the Gossiping corner store owner. Who told everyone in the neighborhood about your spending habits and how well that Anti-itch cream worked on old man Johnson and how happy his wife is.
Back in the old days because of these judgmental humans people didn't use a lot of health care products because how it would make you look to the community. The AI
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No it is about figuring out real time demand for products and services. When I walk into a store, I am Customer 203392228
I spent 4.5 seconds comparing Product X over Product Y, I purchased Product Y, it seems that it was $0.20 cheaper then X. However I Purchased Product A over Product B and Product A was $0.50 more expensive.
Customer 203392228 seems to prefer Quality in the Category where Product A and B are in, while Price in the product that Product X and Y are in. However being the amount of time I to
Advertising is where this money is at (Score:2)
Hey look at that, an ad in my social media feed for Schnitzengruben, I was looking at that in the Amazon store just yesterday...
Re: Advertising is where this money is at (Score:2)
Too bad people arent more oppositionally inclined. I never click ads. I am so oppositional I will either never buy it out of spite, or find a competitor. Mostly the former, as the latter lends itself to false flag advertising.
This isnâ(TM)t all that new (Score:2)
SAMs tried doing this also. Not just withe the U-scan but also the scan and pay with your mobile device. It did nothing to speed up checkout. In fact it only made the task of getting the hell out of the store that much longer. Why? Because people steal shit. And because people steal shit, they go over every item i. Your basket and compare it, item by item with your receipt.
Ever go to a Burlington Coat Factory? Their profit margins are so razor thin, good luck using the bathroom while you are there. An atten
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In fact it only made the task of getting the hell out of the store that much longer. Why? Because people steal shit. And because people steal shit, they go over every item i. Your basket and compare it, item by item with your receipt.
The number one reason Amazon's system is attractive is to eliminate losses. No more checking the basket as you leave because the machines watch literally everything you do anywhere in the store. Pick up a pack of gum and don't put it down? You'll be billed for it. Doesn't matter how slickly you tried to hide the motion that got the pack of gum into your hand. Sure a human wouldn't notice. The machines saw the weight on the shelf decrease, and it was your smartphone that was standing next to the shelf
This is HUUGE (Score:2)
Bye, Bye NCR et.al. it is a total disruption.
It wipes out front end cashiers, registers, scanners and leaves a load on backend packing, weighing, tagging etc...
So this is a 3 yr at most TTL for the olde guard
sill need the age checker! (Score:2)
sill need the age checker!
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Do you? Is that a hard legal requirement or do you just have to make some reasonable effort at age verification. I don't know the law here. I assumed that stores could use some sort of OCR to read the dates, and face-id technology to match peoples face on camera to the ID they are also presenting to the camera; but they don't because it would be creepy and false negatives would probably be high in a lot of states where your license is good for 10 years and you can renew, without updating your photo.
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This could also allow for stores to put more effort in customer service.
WIth these new sets of automation technologies. Stores are going to need to find new ways to be competitive because if all the stores are the same you walk in pick up your product and leave. Then there is little incentive to try store A over Store B. unless Store B is closer to your home.
Because of these efficiencies employees can be used for better customer service. Helping people find the right sized clothing, aid them in making dec
Janes Addiction (Score:3)
Walk right through the door
Hey all right!
If I get by, it's mine
Mine all mine!
Shoplifting becomes obsolete (Score:1)
I'm certain, the same tech recognizes known thieves immediately and is capable of preventing customers to load more than their credit card's limit as well. It should also be able to identify assholes like these [wpxi.com] promptly, allowing police to pick 'em up the same night, stolen candy still in their backpacks.
I welcome the end of shopli
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I welcome the end of shoplifting...
Even if true, at what cost? Mass surveillance. To make this work they are collecting your biometrics, your identity, and have a definitive record of your shopping data. They are under no obligation to not sell all of this data to the highest bidder.
However, I think you are overly optimistic about your "the end of shoplifting" - it will just move toward fooling image recognition. Two possible avenues here - fool system by having your purchases charged to someone else in the store, fool system to charge you
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To make this work they are collecting your biometrics, your identity, and have a definitive record of your shopping data.
If you are paying in a normal store with a credit card or phone, you are already providing this information.
it will just move toward fooling image recognition.
Amazon challenged journalists to try to steal. Only one was successful. Each successful theft is followed by fixing the bug that allowed it to happen.
these stores will be an excellent way to use mules to cash-in on stolen credit card data.
Since your purchase is tied to both your face and your phone, I don't think so.
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To make this work they are collecting your biometrics, your identity, and have a definitive record of your shopping data.
If you are paying in a normal store with a credit card, you are already providing this information.
Categorically not true. If you are paying with your credit car, and if you are not part of loyalty card program, then store only gets approved/declined information about your transaction. This is because payment processors do not share data with retailers.
Think about this, why would most store chains offer loyalty programs if they could have your data some other way?
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Has nothing to do with payment-processors — the store can record the credit-card used and link you to all prior purchases made with it themselves, without a need for an outside party.
And, BTW, the payment-processors — and the card-issuers — aren't under any obligation to sell you off to the highest bidder either. They just have to tell you about it (in some places) and offer you a chance to "opt out" from some of it.
The te
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You don't seem to comprehend the cost of theft, if you dismiss it so easily... From the cost of locks, the theft-prevention procedures, to the security-folks' salaries, retail theft costs billions [money.com]...
Retailers have all that already — unless you reject the discounts offered by the shopping/loyalty cards and pay cash. It could get newsworthy sometimes —
Will it work with wic and food stamps? (Score:2)
Will it work with wic and food stamps?
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Will it work with wic and food stamps?
No [businessinsider.com].
And in related near-future news, (Score:3)
retailers are starting to notice a fall-off in sales as fewer and fewer people have enough money to purchase what they're offering.
Because it's not as though the price of what retailers are selling is going down significantly - almost all of the money saved by turning minimum-wage staff out onto the street, (and increasingly, higher-wage staff as well), is going to the shareholders. Most shareholders probably aren't shopping at the places where attentive, (or not-so-attentive) staff are being replaced by technology. Even if they were, there aren't enough of them to sustain the retail sector.
Have the purveyors and adopters of all this human-replacing tech stopped to think about the logical outcome? Yeah, I know, "buggy whips" and all that crap... But I'm not seeing all of those new jobs that technocrats have been promising will come with all of these new innovations. All I see is automation far, far outstripping its own ability to provide jobs. Realistically, we should all be living like kings and working 20 hours a week or less. But the black hole of wealth concentration simply isn't allowing that to happen. So fewer and fewer people will hold more and more resources until 95% or more of the human population is utterly ghettoized. And with the power, reach, and surveillance capabilities of the point-zero-one-percenters, a corrective revolution seems increasingly less likely.
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And this is actually why taxes on the top 1% of the top 1% are so important and nobody should have a problem with it. Otherwise, the whole economy is just one giant funnel sending money upward to never "trickle" back down.
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Ultimately it will return to some kind of equilibrium. Not that I am big fan of price control, and I think the "fight for 15" is still way to soon but the minimum wage will go up. If you work 40hrs now at $12 and wage increases push that to 16, over the next 5 or 10 years you can have your hours cut to 30 and still be in about the same spot. This is where things will probably go and its where we should want them to go. Wages floors will move some capital away from upward concentration to labor's pockets.
We
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Have the purveyors and adopters of all this human-replacing tech stopped to think about the logical outcome?
Yes, yes they have. The plan is that the workers borrow from the increasingly wealthy shareholders in order to survive, thus becoming not only poor but indentured servants as well. And their children too.
These people want real power. Money is just how they are getting it, and the gullible middle class who believe the same run down shack they bought 20 years ago has now tripled in value (and hence they can take out more debt against it) are falling for it hook line and sinker.
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I don't know what the grand answer is. My initial thoughts: UBI will encourage laziness (human nature) and more babies (also hu
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These stores are not owned by "the 1%", but by you and me, and everyone else.
if you own 1000s of shares of various retailers...you may be in the 1%
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> I'm not seeing all of those new jobs
Oh?
25 years and change ago, Amazon was not even a thing. Now, according to Wikipedia, they employ 798000 people. And according to their jobs page, they have 41104 positions open.
25 years ago, Google was not a thing. Today, they employ 114,096 people. Also, sourced from Wikipedia. And according to their jobs page, they have 2944 positions open.
25 years ago, Facebook wasn't a thing. Today, they employ 44,942. Wikipedia again. And according to their jobs page, t
A suffocating atmosphere (Score:2)
Tech sounds cool but I actually walked into an Amazon GO store in Manhattan and started to feel sick. Had to walk out. There were neither shoppers nor manager. No air movement, it felt like just the warmth generated by hot electrical equipment. It did not feel clean. I had no faith that anything sold there was fresh. It was a very strange experience, the closest I have had are two situations:
- I once bought sandwiches from a Walgreens and when I mentioned it people were incredulous / disgusted since they ar
Why? (Score:2)
Why would I want to "just walk out" without knowing exactly how much I've spent?
I want to know exactly how much I am spending, right when I am spending it.
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wave it in front of your phone. or add it up in your head. check your email when you walk out to see your receipt.
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Sure, you want to know that. And they don't want you to know. They want you to spend more. Just like people using credit cards spend more than people using cash.
Makes sense (Score:2)
Remember, Amazon doesn't want to be a product monopoly or a service monopoly, the types of monopoly people are familiar with. It wants to be a platform monopoly. This is basically bringing the Amazon.com model to brick-and-mortar stores, and once they have a store's inventory information entered digitally, I expect they'll be pushing retailers to list their goods on Amazon.com as well.
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This is basically bringing the Amazon.com model to brick-and-mortar stores, and once they have a store's inventory information entered digitally,
That’s not a “once” as much as “if”. One of hardest things about stores like grocery stores is getting a current, updated inventory. Stores keeping inventory up to date is a challenge even with modern POS systems.