Check out this week's coolest retail technology plays
RTIH Editor, Scott Thompson, brings you his top ‘future of retail systems’ deployments from the past week, including social media powered hotels, rapid grocery delivery services, and checkout-free stores.
Argos and Pinterest
UK retailer Argos and social media platform Pinterest have announced The Argos Mood Hotel.
Located in Bethnal Green, London, this has been curated using interior design products from Argos, based on the hottest interiors trends emerging from Pinterest Predicts.
Rooms are open to the public from 2nd April to 4th April, with five suites available to book online for complimentary overnight stays.
Registrations open at 6am on 7th March and will close on Friday 1st April. Click here for further details.
Farfetch
Online luxury fashion retail platform Farfetch is on the hunt for innovative startups.
It is offering companies the chance to showcase their solutions, connect with experts and stakeholders at Farfetch, pilot their technology, and build partnerships with the group.
Farfetch is looking for startups whose focus areas are digital fashion, Web3, size and fit, beauty tech, sustainability and social commerce.
Applications are open from 8th to 31st March.
Amazon
Amazon has opened an Amazon Fresh store in Kensington, London, powered by its Just Walk Out technology.
Located at 138 Kensington High Street, this is the 17th such location in the UK, lining up alongside the likes of Southwark, Camden, Ealing, White City Canary Wharf and Holborn Chancery Lane.
To shop, customers scan the QR code from their Amazon app, buy what they need, and walk out.
Perfect Corp.
Artificial intelligence and augmented reality beauty and fashion tech solutions provider, Perfect Corp., has launched what is pitched as the first ever virtual try-on NFT collection.
Twitter is beta testing a new mobile first feature called Twitter Shops, which will allow merchants to showcase up to 50 curated products on their profiles.
The feature, which is free to use, gives people the chance to view products from the profiles of brands, so when they talk about and discover products on their timeline, they can also browse them on Twitter.
“When you go to the profile of a merchant that has Shops enabled, you’ll see a “View shop” button just above their tweets,” Twitter says in an online post.
“When you tap the button, it will open up that merchant’s shop, where you can scroll through items.”
“When you’re ready to purchase, you can click on the product of your choice which will open an in-app browser where you can learn more about the product and checkout on the merchant’s website.”
Nisa Retail
Nisa Retail has increased the number of stores participating in a UK roll-out of Jisp’s Scan & Save technology, bringing the total to 54.
Scan & Save’s in-store digital voucher redemption system allows customers to save money on branded products by scanning barcodes with the Jisp app.
Retailers also earn 2p every time a customer taps an augmented reality voucher, along with a further 4p for every redemption.
The Fresh Market
Shoppertainment startup Firework has announced a partnership with The Fresh Market, an American chain of supermarkets.
The tie up brings Firework’s full suite of live commerce and short-form shoppable video capabilities to The Fresh Market’s owned media channels.
The Fresh Market first tapped Firework for a digital transformation initiative in Q4 2021, with the goal of “extending its reach to next-generation consumers and positioning itself for continued growth in the digital first era”.
Jumbo Supermarkten and Gorillas
Dutch supermarket chain Jumbo Supermarkten has started a rapid grocery delivery service via a partnership with German startup Gorillas.
The pair are kicking things off in Groningen, Rotterdam and Tilburg.
In the coming weeks, the service will be expanded to the other Dutch cities where the latter is active.
Jumbo will supply a large part of its range to Gorillas, including private label products and some from the La Place brand.
Gorillas also works with Tesco in the UK, and Casino Group in France.
what3words
RNIB (Royal National Institute of Blind People) and what3words are calling on UK event organisers and venue managers to provide additional address information in order to help blind and partially sighted people to arrive exactly where they need to be.
what3words has divided the globe into 57 trillion 3m x 3m squares and given each one a unique address.
Robin Spinks, RNIB’s Senior Manager Inclusive Design and Innovation, says: “As someone with sight loss, I know from experience that street addresses often don’t provide precise locations.”
“They might take you to the right building but then you’ve got to work out if you’ve come to the right entrance or need to be on the other side of the building entirely.”
“Using what3words can help to reduce that anxiety and uncertainty and the extra time saved can be spent catching up with a friend or kicking off a business meeting rather than apologising to them for arriving late.”
Marks and Spencer
UK retailer Marks and Spencer is scaling its omnichannel capabilities in India with IBM Sterling supply chain solutions.
It is streamlining the order fulfilment process using IBM Sterling’s Order Management with real-time Inventory Visibility, a microservices-based solution running on IBM Cloud, along with call centre capabilities to expand its digital presence and accelerate business growth.
