Shownotes
In this Omni Talk Retail episode, recorded live from NRF 2026 at the Vusion booth, Jacob Tveraabak, Group Chief Executive Officer of StrongPoint, joins Anne Mezzenga and Chris Walton to discuss how in-store order picking, grocery efficiency, and store-based fulfillment are becoming critical to profitable grocery ecommerce.
Jacob explains why grocery presents a fundamentally different operational challenge than other retail categories, driven by high item velocity, low margins, and large basket sizes. Drawing on StrongPoint’s Scandinavian roots, he shares how high labor costs have forced retailers to engineer ultra-efficient picking solutions and why those lessons are increasingly relevant for U.S. grocers.
Key Topics Covered:
- Why grocery order picking requires a fundamentally different technology approach
- How labor costs drive efficiency and innovation in Scandinavian retail
- The role of in-store picking in profitable grocery ecommerce
- Store-based fulfillment vs centralized fulfillment centers
- Integrating order picking with shelf visibility and store data
- Reducing substitution, mis-picks, and wasted labor
- How connected store infrastructure improves execution at scale
- Why stores are becoming the backbone of future grocery fulfillment
Thank you to Vusion for supporting Omni Talk Retail’s live coverage from NRF 2026, and thank you to our listeners for tuning in throughout the week.
#NRF2026 #StrongPoint #GroceryRetail #OrderPicking #StoreBasedFulfillment #RetailOperations #ConnectedStores #RetailTechnology #OmniTalkRetail
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Transcripts
Welcome back everyone.
Speaker A:This is Omnitalk Retail.
Speaker A:I'm Anne Mazinga.
Speaker B:And I'm Chris Walton.
Speaker A:And we're back again, day three of NRF here at the Javits Center.
Speaker A: from the fusion booth, number: Speaker A:And we have another guest for you.
Speaker A:We are joined today by Jacob Traverbach, the CEO of strongpoint.
Speaker A:Jacob, welcome to omnitalk.
Speaker C:Thank you so much.
Speaker A:Maybe let's start by having you give our audience a little bit of background on what strongpoint does and then kind of what you see in your oversee in your role as CEO.
Speaker C:Okay, thank you.
Speaker C:So yes, strongpoint, we are a retail technology company out of Scandinavia originally four years.
Speaker C:This year we have a European presence, hopefully soon to make a US presence as well.
Speaker A:Love to hear it.
Speaker C:And what we're here to showcase at NRF with Fusion is our order picking solution.
Speaker A:Okay.
Speaker C:And there's a in store order picking solution specifically made for grocers.
Speaker C:And we believe it's the world's best, the world's fastest solution.
Speaker C:And you know, we're starting to get some quite good customer names in Europe, hopefully seeing that in the US as well.
Speaker C:And I think, you know what's important for us to sort of get across.
Speaker C:I mean, you know, how could it be that a Scandinavian based company has developed the most efficient order picking solution for grocers?
Speaker C:I really think it has to do something about where we come from.
Speaker C:You have to realize that, you know, if you're operating a grocery store in Scandinavia, you're paying 30, $35 per hour.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker C:I don't think anywhere else in the world you're paying those.
Speaker A:Not that we're aware of.
Speaker A:No.
Speaker A:That's a, that's a pretty high minimum wage.
Speaker A:Yes.
Speaker C:And so what that does is that it's automatically pushing us and our retail customers to be just very, very efficient.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker C:So any kind of solution we put in just have to be super efficient.
Speaker C: And so actually in back in: Speaker C:They didn't really realize themselves how good it was.
Speaker B:Nice.
Speaker C:We have continued to invest in that, making it cloud based, putting on a lot of more features.
Speaker C:And so that's why we're here, to showcase the world's best order picking solution for grocers.
Speaker B:So Jacob, you mentioned, you mentioned the fundamental reason why, you know, you developed this solution particularly in Scandinavia, but now as you look to the US market, why is it so important to get this right through the technology, like what have you seen work and what have you seen doesn't work as retailers try to grapple with more efficient in store picking.
Speaker C:Yeah, I think, you know, there's, I think, you know, one thing that I don't think a lot of people get if you're not in the grocery retail business is that, you know, you think that grocery is all about sort of having a big skew range.
Speaker C:I mean, that's not the real uniqueness compared to other kind of retail industries.
Speaker C:But what's unique about groceries?
Speaker C:The share volume going through, I mean, the velocity.
Speaker C:Right, right.
Speaker C:And so when you're shopping groceries online, you're not shopping, you know, one or two items like most people do when they shop, say shoes, but you shop maybe 50, 60 items for next day delivery.
Speaker C:And so being super efficient in that kind of solution, it really makes the difference.
Speaker C:I mean, I truly believe that unless you're tailor making a solution for exactly that use case and rather trying to use sort of a say, jogging shoe picking solution into your grocery space, that's not going to work.
Speaker B:It's not going to work.
Speaker C:I think that's the biggest mistake we see.
Speaker B:Got it.
Speaker B:So it's the volume that's required for a grocery operation because of the low margins inherently.
Speaker B:That's why you have the high throughput and that's what you're helping to, to take the cost pressures out of.
Speaker A:Okay, so Jacob, then how do you fit into like what Fusion is doing then in the store?
Speaker A:I mean, we talk a lot about Fusion having pick to light to help speed people through their shopping experience.
Speaker A:But if I'm a retailer thinking about like, I'm trying to consolidate my point solutions, I'm trying to figure out how to be more efficient operationally.
Speaker A:Where do, where do you fit in and where does strong point fit in?
Speaker C:I mean, that's, this is, this is really important for us.
Speaker C:And it's, you know, I would like to start with a little bit of background.
Speaker C:I mean like we as strongpad have been working with electronic shelf labels again in the, in the, in Europe, in Scandinavia for more than 15 years.
Speaker B:Okay, right.
Speaker C:And again, 501 5.
Speaker A:Oh, 1 5.
Speaker A:Okay.
Speaker A:I was like, whoa, what?
Speaker A:You invented electronic shelf labels, Jacob.
Speaker A:This is new information.
Speaker A:Okay, okay.
Speaker C:We didn't do that.
Speaker C:So, so but 15 still, you know, it's a very long time of sort of having experience with ESLs.
Speaker C:And again, you know, because of the high labor costs in Scandinavia, that's exactly the places where you want to or where you see the Business case make sense for right now, what we also done with the electronic shelf labels, but not only electronic shelf labels, the entire vuition portfolio is to enhance the speed of efficiency even more.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:And equality.
Speaker C:So I'll give a couple of examples, which is why the partnership we have now with Fusion is so important.
Speaker C:Number one is you said it yourself, pick to light.
Speaker C:So instead of looking for the store associated looking for the item to be picked, you get the flash from the ESLs to help the pickers.
Speaker C:Secondly, and what we're introducing here at NRF is also put to tote.
Speaker C:So you've picked an item, now where are you going to put it?
Speaker C:Because there's six different customers or 12 different customers wanting the item you want.
Speaker C:Find that tote immediately.
Speaker C:And then thirdly, which we're also showcasing here today at NREF is the integration with Fusion's Captana cameras.
Speaker C:And the cameras are basically taking a snapshot of what is on shelf.
Speaker C:And so when you're starting a pick route, whether that's for cucumbers or for scheduled deliveries, you want to make sure that those items are on the shelf.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker C:Not on stock, but on shelf.
Speaker A:Yes.
Speaker C:Because once the picker gets there to pick the item, unless it's on the.
Speaker A:Shelf, they're not going to pick it.
Speaker A:They're not going to pick it, they don't care.
Speaker C:So those are three things that we're doing now.
Speaker C:We have a super exciting roadmap together with Fusion.
Speaker C:I'll give you one other example.
Speaker C:I'm truly passionate about this to increase the speed even more of picking.
Speaker C:And that is taking the Geo positioning from the new Edge Sense technology with Vision Hub and basically layering the orders to be picked on top of that.
Speaker C:And that allows you to do a perfect linear programming, finding the exact, perfect and shortest route to the items to pick.
Speaker B:Wow.
Speaker A:Wow.
Speaker A:All about efficiency.
Speaker C:All about efficiency.
Speaker B:It's really interesting.
Speaker B:You describe that really well too in terms of how you're triangulating all these pieces of data and providing that insight to the retailers through your software platform.
Speaker B:So nice job with that question I have for you though, as you're trying to get into the US market, is is you mentioned shelf labels.
Speaker B:15 years for the US grocers who aren't as acclimated to electronic shelf labels.
Speaker B:Is that a requirement to get the benefits of your solution or just a nice to have to get the benefits of your solution?
Speaker C:It's a nice to have.
Speaker C:Thanks for asking the question.
Speaker C:I think in many instances you're gonna see our order picking Solution going in first.
Speaker B:Okay.
Speaker C:And you know, again, as costs of ESLs come down and labor costs and the shortage of labor going up, you will also see that the business case for ESLs are going to make sense when you combine the efficiency, the added efficiency you can get with order picking, but also the myriad of other use cases.
Speaker B:Oh yeah, there's so many other use cases.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker C:So I think, you know, we'll see what happens.
Speaker C:But in many cases it's going to be order picking solution, hopefully for a strong point first and then you'll have ESLs.
Speaker B:So if you look to the future now and we talk the implications of technology like this, how will in store picking be different in the US three to five years from now than it is today?
Speaker C:I think it's just going to increase in size.
Speaker C:I mean, of course you've had the, what should I say, the incident with Kroger and Ocado, which have put a lot of pressure on the traditional CFC model, sort of large fulfillment centers.
Speaker C:And so we're giving and vision is doing this as well, you know, giving a lot of confidence back to retailers that, you know what the stores, that's the most important asset you have.
Speaker C:And that could actually be the fulfillment arena for e grocers.
Speaker C:And so it fits actually quite perfectly in with exactly what strongpoint is doing.
Speaker B:Great, great.
Speaker A:Well, let's close with what's ahead.
Speaker A: on at StrongPoint, Jacob, in: Speaker C:So it's all about getting these integrations.
Speaker C:We just talked about the new innovations getting it out there in store.
Speaker A:Okay.
Speaker C:I like to say that when PowerPoint meets reality, reality wins.
Speaker C:Of course, that's what customers want to see.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:They want to see it live in action.
Speaker C:And we have operations on our order picking solutions spanning from New Zealand down there to the right, so to speak, all the way through Europe and hopefully also very soon in the U.S. in.
Speaker A:The U.S. all right, well, well, thank you so much for taking the time with us, Jacob.
Speaker A:It was so wonderful to meet you and to introduce our audience to strongpoint.
Speaker A:Thanks again to Viewsion for helping us bring all of our NRF coverage these last three days to you listening at home.
Speaker A: this afternoon, booth number: Speaker A:And until our next interview, be careful out there.