Top trends in retail technology during 2021

RTIH runs through the hottest retail systems trends from the past 12 months, including rapid delivery, checkout free stores, augmented reality, and non-fungible token (NFTs).

Rapid delivery

Love it (the people need and deserve delivery within 15 minutes of placing their orders) or hate it (it’s killing the planet, man!), you couldn’t ignore the booming rapid delivery space in 2021.

There were mega funding rounds aplenty, most recently courtesy of Jokr, which landed $260 million in Series B funding and ventured into unicorn territory with a valuation of $1.2 billion.

In September, supply chain consultant and former Amazon executive, Brittain Ladd, told RTIH: “The investment activity taking place in the rapid grocery delivery industry is being done for one reason - to strengthen companies against the growing value and popularity of Getir.”

“Also, the valuations being assigned to Gorillas and Flink, defy the laws of finance, mathematics, and logic. In my opinion, there is an ‘invisible hand of collusion’ artificially inflating their valuations.”

He added: “Although there are many rapid grocery delivery companies, only a few will survive. Several have already been acquired and there will be more acquisitions in the future.”

“I believe that rapid grocery delivery is a viable business model, but only a few companies will succeed. I anticipate that there will be many changes. I must also point out that not all of the companies will enter the US market.”

“Rapid grocery delivery isn’t only about groceries. It’s about the future of delivering all retail products quickly. 

Checkout free stores

Hardly a month went by in 2021 without a new checkout free store grabbing headlines.

Most recently, Sainsbury’s opened a location in London during late November, using Amazon’s Just Walk Out technology.

This made it the first customer outside the US for the tech that powers Amazon Go and Fresh stores. 

Rival Tesco launched GetGo, powered by Trigo tech.

Whilst Amazon opened a number of Amazon Fresh stores in London.

Jemima Walker, Associate Thematic Analyst at GlobalData, commented: “There is a real chance for success in the UK for checkout-free stores, as evidenced by the rapid adoption of self-checkout technology in recent years.”

“Retailers that do not jump on the growing trend may find themselves falling behind.”

Augmented reality

In September, Jisp launched an augmented reality vouchering system, Scan & Save, for brands, independent retailers and their customers. 

The solution was initially deployed in 12 Nisa stores across the UK, allowing customers to exclusively save up to 60% on more than 65 products from the likes of Mondelez, PepsiCo, Kelloggs, Molson Coors and Nomad Foods. 

Combining Scandit’s AR technology with Jisp’s consumer app, Scan & Save reads product barcodes and presents promotions, which customers can then save and redeem with their mobile phones. 

Retailers are also remunerated for each scan and redemption of the voucher.

Other 2021 standouts include Snap announcing a virtual try-on partnership with online luxury fashion platform Farfetch.

At the Snap Partner Summit, it brought this to life by featuring three jackets from Off-White, using voice and machine learning powered technology. Shoppers were able to try on outfits and swap them, using just their voices.

Snap also teamed with Perfect Corp. to launch a shoppable Lens experience with first brand partner, The Estée Lauder Companies. 

M·A·C Cosmetics was among the first brands in The Estée Lauder Companies’ portfolio to launch Dynamic Shopping Lenses on their Snapchat profile, utilising its existing try-on experiences created with Perfect Corp. 

Livestream shoppable events

Walmart kicked off Cyber Week with a shoppable livestream event featuring Jason Derulo.

This beta tested Twitter’s shoppable livestream function, allowing customers to shop products straight from the platform. 

“This will be the first time a brand in the US has leveraged this capability on Twitter and I’m excited to bring customers incredible deals on a platform they already love during the most joyful shopping season of the year,” said William White, Chief Marketing Officer, Walmart U.S.

“Twitter is a platform where we consistently see high return across top-and middle-of-funnel content, so it’s a natural next step for us to explore this new functionality.”

Elsewhere,  Firework announced a new partnership with Albertsons Companies.

The food and drug giant is the first US grocer to utilise the Firework platform, bringing online shoppers shoppable, short-form and livestream video experiences.

“This partnership is an important step in Albertsons Companies digital transformation journey to redefine customer engagement in the grocery retail space,” said Chris Rupp, Chief Customer and Digital Officer at Albertsons Companies.

“This isn’t just about creating new ways to feature our products. This is about bringing delight and inspiration to digital shopping to make online experiences as fun as discovering new products in our stores.”

She added: “With Firework, we found the first platform capable of digitally recreating the sense of freshness, discovery and community that you previously could only find within our stores, all using the video and livestream formats that our digital shoppers love most.”

NFTs

The Collins Dictionary recently announced its shortlist for word of 2021, and declared NFT, the abbreviation of non-fungible token, as top of the heap, beating out the likes of crypto, metaverse and hybrid working.

If we’re being absolutely honest, we don’t understand half the stuff that NFT enthusiasts come out with.

Nonetheless, the following initiatives certainly sound cool, and we’re interested to see what happens throughout 2022.

The Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade celebrated its 95th anniversary this year with a drop of 9,500 free NFT artwork, featuring balloons from past events in support of Make-A-Wish.

A charitable auction of 10 NFTs began on Friday, 19th November. Limited edition free Macy’s Parade NFTs launched on Thursday, 25th November.

The Dalmore Highland Single Malt partnered with BlockBar, a NFT marketplace for luxury wine and spirits, to offer a limited edition liquor NFT with a set of The Dalmore Decades No.4 Collection. 

And Shopify made it possible for eligible merchants to sell NFTs (non-fungible tokens) through their e-commerce stores.

One of the first out of the traps was the NBA’s Chicago Bulls.