Amazon will launch smart shopping carts at its Los Angeles-area grocery store in 2020.
Amazon
Amazon is launching shopping carts that track items as shoppers add them, then automatically charges for them when they pick up grocery bags, allowing them to skip the checkout line. The Dash Carts will launch at the new Amazon grocery store in the Los Angeles area, which is slated to open in 2020, the company announced Tuesday.
Dash Carts is based on “Just Walk Out” cashless technology first implemented in Amazon Go convenience stores. Opened to the public in 2018, Amazon Go stores allow customers to buy items without waiting on the checkout lines. The company has dabbled in the grocery market in recent years, but with ATM-free technology, Amazon hopes to make the shopping experience more enjoyable and differentiate itself from other physical retailers.
Buyers must have an Amazon account and a smartphone to use a Dash Cart. After entering the store, users scan a QR code, located in the Amazon app, which registers them in the cart and loads the Alexa shopping lists.
Each cart is equipped with cameras that use computer vision to identify items as they are bagged inside the cart, and a built-in scale to weigh them if necessary. For items like fresh produce, buyers enter the item’s four-digit code and quantity on the display, which tracks weight and price. The cart is also equipped with a coupon scanner that applies any refund to the buyer’s order. The carts are designed for small to medium-sized grocery trips, where shoppers can leave the store with one or two bags of items.
As shoppers add and remove items, a display at the front of the cart adjusts the total price.
When they’re ready to go, shoppers head out the store’s Dash Cart lane. The company charges the credit card linked to your Amazon account and sends a copy of the receipt by email.
A screen in the cart automatically calculates the total cost of each order.
Amazon
Unlike Amazon Go locations, which offer a variety of take-out foods and snacks, the Woodland Hills grocery store resembles a conventional supermarket, both in its offerings and design. The Woodland Hills location will be part of a new Amazon supermarket chain, expected to open in 2020, that the company has been using to fulfill grocery delivery orders during the pandemic.
The California store’s expanded offerings presented a number of new challenges when Amazon designed the Dash Cart, as the full-size supermarket has a “large catalog of items,” said Dilip Kumar, vice president of physical and technology sales for Amazon. , In an interview.
“You should be able to add that and track all of that, and that only increases the complexity,” Kumar said. “In addition, the weighing component must also be very robust to enable a very accurate reception experience for a customer.”
Dash Carts are integrated with a variety of cameras and sensors, however, apart from the display, they look like a standard shopping cart. This was by design, Kumar said.
“We try to hide that complexity from customers so that they don’t have to learn new buying behaviors,” he said. “Once you’re signed in with your phone, you can save it and your normal way of shopping doesn’t change.”
Amazon has continued to expand its ATM technology beyond its Go convenience stores. In February, Amazon opened its first large, cashier-less grocery store, called Amazon Go Grocery, in the Capitol Hill neighborhood of Seattle. The store stocks around 5,000 items, including fresh produce, baked goods, meats, and household items such as paper towels.
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