Media

Concierge Key to the future of grocery shopping

I don’t know about you, but I can’t stand grocery shopping.

John Updike, in his short story "A&P" described the shopping experience as a pinball machine: you were launched when you entered the doors, you bumped around the aisles for a while, but you inevitably ended up between the flippers at the checkstand.

However, the pinball doesn’t get stuck in a long line at the checkstand. I can’t stand the waiting in long lines, especially with impatient children. I think you know what I’m talking about. Having worked at a checkout stand, I understand from both sides how it feels when an item won’t scan or when problems arise on the line that make me light my "Help" light. Nothing is worse than making a customer wait longer than he or she has to.

Springboard Retail Networks has found a way to help out those who detest the grocery shopping experience with the Concierge. As you can see, the Concierge has a simple design of a shopping cart with a computer on it. Nice.

If you’re like me, you have a list that you bring to the store. If you are a customer of Concierge (I have no idea if you will have to be an on-line member) you can have a personalized access key or scan a store loyalty car with the barcode scanner. Too bad Safeway doesn’t have this already, because I already have a card with them. Assuming that I had the discipline to put in my grocery list at a previous time, I could upload it right there.

Then, if I had a problem finding that item, I could use the store’s comprehensive store directory and built-in compass in order to find my item. In fact, the Concierge has an In-Store Cart Tracking feature so it knows where my cart is. That may sound a little like Big Brother, but I prefer the term Big Mother. I don’t see this on the site, but it doesn’t sound like it would be hard to make a problem that could give me a Mapquest-like diagram of the best trip through my store. After all, who wants to double-back to the soup aisle simply because you forgot to pick up a can of Campbell’s earlier?

Once you find the item, you place it in the Concierge, and it automatically scans and marks it off your virtual shopping list. This feature is really handy when you find a recipe, and you need specific ingredients. In fact, the Concierge plans to have a database of recipes that will create shopping lists for you.

And when you’re ready to check out, just swipe your credit or debit card. The payment is made wirelessly, with no waiting in line. I’m not certain how this will stop shoplifters though. After all, I could easily fill my cart with stuff and just leave. Unless they have some system like Shopko has where you have to show the person a receipt on the way out. Something tells me that they’ll probably have some automated system with alarms and bars that will totally embarrass the one customer who forgot to scan his or her item.

I’m telling you, I love this Concierge, but are we at the point where this type of technology is affordably made? I mean every cart needs WiFi, for crying out loud! That can’t be cheap. However, technology like cell phones and MP3 Players is just getting cheaper by the day.

I would like to see, no, I demand that every cart be a Concierge by the next decade. In fact, I would like to see them self-automated. That way, I won’t have to take them anywhere after I drop my groceries off in my car. The carts can just go back to the store on their own.

Speaking of cart storage, I’m sure that Springboard Retail Network has already thought about this, but most grocery stores have their carts cramped together in long rows. The Concierge, with its protruding computer screen, doesn’t look like it was built for that type of storage. I’m sure somebody has already thought of that, or retailers are going to have to free up a lot of space.