Supermarkets are gradually being developed, and shopping carts will also work differently in the future.
The well-known deposit system is being replaced by a new technology.
The computer age has long since reached supermarkets.
Digitization is also finding its way there.
So shopping in the future will look different from what we are used to.
In the case of shopping carts, the well-known deposit system is about to be replaced.
The new technology is already ready for the market.
With our brand new
consumer newsletter
you will always stay up to date with consumer information and product recalls.
Munich - In the age of digitization, colleague computers have long played an important role in most people's everyday lives.
Shopping for everyday needs is not excluded from this development.
Pretty much any desired product or article has long been available online and delivered to your home, even groceries.
Will there be no supermarket branches at all in the future?
Stationary retail is likely to continue for many years, regardless of the effects of the corona pandemic.
The supermarket of the future: digitization does not stop at the shopping cart either
Supermarkets are continuously trying to react flexibly to customer needs and to simplify shopping.
However, technical advances are also taking place so that consumers can spend as much money as possible and thus drive sales up.
This is by no means a modern phenomenon:
The invention of the shopping trolley is groundbreaking in this regard.
In the 1930s, a certain Sylvan Goldman in the US state of Oklahoma provided customers of his "Humpty Dumpty" supermarket with a small vehicle with which they could transport their purchases.
This was not only for convenience, but also sold more because of the better storage options.
In Germany, in the following decade, it was the entrepreneur Rudolf Wanzl from Baden-Württemberg who designed a further development, for example with a fixed basket.
Today that company is a global player in the shopping trolley business.
The useful utensils are exported to markets around the world, including the retail giant Walmart in the USA.
In this country, the large discount chains Lidl and Aldi are among their customers.
A groundbreaking invention in this context was the introduction of the deposit system: since the mid-1980s, shopping carts can only be moved if they are detached with a coin or chip (or a perfidious trick is used).
Today, less of the wire trolleys are lost than in the past: Before the changeover, the vehicles were regularly stolen and often found in front gardens or public places.
Shopping carts: The deposit system will soon be replaced by a smartphone application
But the current system will not last very long in nations like Germany: Manufacturer Wanzl is developing a link between shopping carts and smartphones.
Allegedly, the technology for unlocking with a pocket computer is already practical.
The way to implementation should then not be long: after all, most of the larger retail companies already have their own apps, for example for offers or to collect points.
The specific challenge is to enable a shopping cart to be unlocked using a smartphone.
“Smart-Trolley” is the name of the digital shopping trolley of the future, which customers should unlock via smartphone or smartwatch.
Classic coins or chips are no longer required.
Focus.de
explains how the procedure then works
: Customers need the app of the supermarket / discounter, hold the mobile device with a deposit lock and, for example, unlock the shopping cart via Bluetooth.
The project, however, raises an important question: What about those people who cannot or do not want to use smartphones, for example because of their age?
Even after the introduction of the “digital shopping cart”, the classic variants should remain usable for a longer period of time.
A Wanzl employee told the
Chip.de
portal
: “We want to gather initial market experience with test phases and see how it is received overall.” It should therefore take a year or two before the new system is rolled out across the board.
Shopping of the future: Corona crisis accelerates digital change
The corona pandemic is accelerating the digital change in the industry, but it started long before that: for years it has been possible to pay cashless by card in supermarkets, and in some places this is also possible with a smartphone.
In addition, electronic price labels are no longer only used in consumer electronics stores, but have long been used by discounters such as Edeka.
When buying clothes in the future, a visit to the changing room may become superfluous.
The Swedish fashion group H&M is working flat out on the development of a digital implementation based on an avatar:
If you consider that the automotive industry is already extensively involved with autonomous driving, a self-driving shopping cart does not seem so absurd in the future.
(PF)