The retail technology week in numbers

1,854...Fetch has developed a transactional gifting bot for Greggs, allowing customers to purchase goods and send to their friends through Facebook Messenger.

The offering integrates into Greggs existing ePOS infrastructure across its 1,854 UK-wide locations. Plans are afoot to put the solution into third party payment platforms such as Apple and Android Pay.

25.1...Waitrose has won the Christmas battle of the inbox, reclaiming the crown from 2017 champ Asda, according to research from Mailjet. The grocery giant rose nearly seven points clear of the pack with a total score of 25.1 out of an available 30.0.

10...Dash is now the exclusive cryptocurrency payment option at all Church’s Chicken Venezuela locations, with 10 of them launching acceptance this week.

29% of US adults make no purchases using cash during a typical week, up from 24% in 2015, according to a Pew Research survey.

100...KFC Venezuela boss, Antonio Sampayo, has denied a recent announcement that it will start accepting altcoin Dash.

KFC has been in discussions with Dash, he said, but nothing has been finalised. Processing payments in this way “is not a fact, nor has the publication of any news about it been authorised", he insisted.

Earlier this year, CEO of Dash Core Group Ryan Taylor said that Venezuela was the venture's second largest market, with almost 100 merchants accepting the cryptocurrency each week.

36%...Harts of Stur says that mobile revenue has risen by over a third following the launch of its new e-commerce site.

The cookware and homeware specialist reports a 36% increase over eight weeks compared to the same period last year alongside a 28% rise in transactions via mobile. It has also seen mobile conversion rates rise by almost 4%.

22%...Retail products ordered online rarely meet consumers’ expectations upon arrival, according to new research from inRiver.

The company surveyed 6,088 shoppers from the UK, Germany, Sweden, Denmark, the Netherlands and Belgium and found that 22% feel let down when they order products online, double the amount of people who are always satisfied. Of the aforementioned 22%, 48% will usually or always return items.

74%...Most UK High Street retailers are not utilising social commerce effectively, despite 74% of the top 50 making it possible for consumers to see featured products when they click on a social image or post, according to research from Curalate.

70% of online retailers are failing to offer a checkoutless commerce experience on mobile, according to research by Gene.

550...Israeli startup, Tracxpoint, is to roll-out its self-checkout solution, Artificial Intelligence Cart (AiC), at Conad del Tirreno, one of the seven cooperatives of Conad, a supermarket chain with more than 3,000 stores in Italy. Implementation will begin during 2019 with 550 stores implementing the tech.

80%...Almost 80% of the UK population shopped online in the last 12 months, with penetration driven by younger consumers, according to GlobalData.

30...Vue Entertainment is claiming a UK mobile payments first, having partnered with Urban Airship to launch Google Pay movie tickets at over 30 of its sites.

43%…The UK now has the lowest proportion of High Street spending in Europe, according to research by Mastercard involving 18,000-plus people. This shows that 43% of spending volume is done physically in stores, while online commerce accounts for 57%. 27% of this is made up by spending on mobile devices.