In the latest edition of Omni Talk’s Retail Fast Five, sponsored by the A&M Consumer and Retail Group, Mirakl, Simbe, Ocampo Capital and Scratch Event DJs Chris Walton and Anne Mezzenga discuss: Do Grocers Really Need ‘Vending Machines’ We Can Unlock With Our Phones?

For the full episode head here:https://youtu.be/xw-boSNx8kc

Cantaloupe has expanded its line of self service vending machines designed to provide shoppers with a convenient in store option, while helping retailers address challenges related to labor, shrink and theft.

According to Progressive Grocer, as part of Cantaloupe's Smart Store series, its new smart store 600 and 700 models can be used to purvey both shelf, stable and fresh items.

That's what's interesting here, folks.

The self service vending machines are installed at a range of businesses including corporate offices, residential buildings, home hotel pantries and grocery and mass retail locations.

The units use weighted shelves and cameras to monitor inventory and feature interactive touchscreens, audio help and visual cues to help shoppers choose the items they want.

And here's my question for you on this Shrink is clearly an issue.

Yes.

Our friend at the A and M consumer and retail group, David Ritter on our annual show called out a similar idea Walmart is testing as the tech of the year for him.

But do you like, do you like that ideas like this are gaining traction?

What are your thoughts on this?

Is this the right way for retailers to go?

I, I think this will, this will be a helpful solution for some retailers in some very specific use cases.

Perhaps it does eliminate your wait times for getting, you know, the cabinets or the glass unlocked in those situations.

But for me, Chris, like I don't know, I was not big on this headline because it still is a less than desirable shopping experience.

I just, I don't think this is the solution.

I think this is a very short term middle of the road investment that, and there's, I can't really fault the retailers because shrink is such a big problem like you talked about.

They are trying to find kind of any piecemeal solutions that they can test to try to see what happens.

But I really think that this is a huge miss and the one of the other reasons that I don't like it, especially when I start to think about how this is tying in and is and as I dug more into this and the Cantaloupe team will have to, you know, bring this up or, or reach out to us and let us know.

But I'm not sure because you're paying with your credit card in that moment, I'm not sure that it's tapping into like point of sale or the, like the rest of the point of sale, the store or my loyalty programs or promotion programs and, and some of these like big ticket items like they mentioned in there, you know, like is this the right thing for like makeup or razors like those are things that a lot of people have couponing associated with.

So if I'm tapping to pay, like do I get loyalty rewards points or is it just the convenience element of it?

So there's still a lot of friction, disjointed things in this solution for me to like be all in on it.

But I, I mean, what do you think?

Are you, you wanted to talk about this headline, Are you into it?

Like, yeah, that's why I want to talk it up.

Because I think, I think it's an interesting philosophical conversation.

I think, you know, I, I think on, on the whole I, I agree with you and actually I think I'd go even a step further and how much I, I actually don't like it.

So with all respect to David Ritter, who I respect immensely, I don't, I don't like the, I don't like the idea at all.

And you know, I, to your point, I can see why retailers are doing it because they've been forced into this situation.

But at the end of the day I think it just pushes more people to shop online.

And if, if you're forcing me to download an app to open a case in the store, why not just force me to do an app scan when I enter the score when I enter the store.

Excuse me, or, or show my loyalty card when I enter the store, similar to Costco or Whole Foods.

That just seems like an easier solution and it doesn't require the expensive hardware and just do that and call it a day that you know, that way the customer experience is better.

You don't introduce all this friction into the experience.

It's a cheaper option.

There are better options even than this if you want to deter theft, which we'll get to in the next headline.

And, and so like at the end of the day it just feels like an over engineered solution to a problem that isn't ultimately that complicated.

That, that is what I think here.

And so I think people started putting things behind glass and now they're thinking about, oh, how do we continue to over engineer that idea?

And that's just, I think that's just bad for the industry.

I do too.

I mean it just reminds me of like an airport or you know, like it's a, it's still a vending machine at the end of the day.

Like you don't get to touch things and I get that you don't get to do that if it's behind glass either.

But I just, none of these are making a better shopping experience in my opinion.

But the one thing I will say, because I've been reading the comments on social media after David's comment in our annual award show, and he said it does seem like consumers want the ability to do this.

So that's, that's probably what's driving the retailers to do this, too.

If they are putting it behind glass, consumers don't want to wait to get help.

They want to be in control of that themselves.

Yeah, so I can see that.

But is that the, is that, is that customer feedback leading you in the right direction in the long run?

I don't think so.

This is sometimes where you have to think beyond the customer.

Right.