Last week’s biggest retail technology plays at a glance
RTIH rounds up the stand out retail systems deals, deployments and pilots from the past seven days. Featuring Primark, Homebase, Monoprix, REVOLVE, boohoo, and Wakefern Food Corp.
Fast fashion big hitter boohoo has announced the launch of its first NFT collection.
Phase one of the brand’s move into this space included the launch of NFT education and community building platform @boohooverse on Twitter and Discord, which aims to onboard the female fashion community into Web3 ahead of the first drop.
boohoo ran a competition to support a second phase. This recruited artists in the NFT space to be part of what is pitched as “the biggest female led NFT collection yet”.
Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield (URW), owner and operator of Westfield shopping centres across the US, the UK and continental Europe, has expanded its international brand partnership with buy now, pay later venture Clearpay.
Wakefern Food Corp., the largest retailer owned cooperative in the US, has announced a pilot with Simbe Robotics to deploy its business intelligence solution, Tally, at stores.
Tally autonomously roams store aisles up to three times per day, leveraging computer vision technology to collect shelf data that ensures products are in-stock, in the correct location, and accurately priced on the sales floor.
Primark has unveiled a new website, featuring thousands of products from across its ranges, as well as a fresh design, enhanced navigation and a new feature that allows customers to check stock availability in their local store.
This is launching first in the UK, before rolling out to Primark’s 13 other markets in the coming months.
Alongside the retailer’s in-house team, EPAM Systems has been the primary design and technology partner for the project.
The site has been built using technology components from a number of digital solution suppliers including Bloomreach, Amplience, commercetools, Microsoft and Salesforce.
Worldline has been chosen by Monoprix to roll-out its omnichannel payment platform across all 700 of the retailer’s stores in 250 towns in France.
The project includes its six retail chains: Monoprix, monop’, monop’daily, monop’beauty, monop’station and Naturalia.
Unilever has partnered with Perch to launch an in-store product engagement platform at Giant Food supermarkets in the Washington DC area.
Interactive end caps in the beauty section incorporate a digital screen that automatically senses what products shoppers touch to respond with videos and information, without having to scan a QR code, touch a screen, download an app etc.
The Fragrance Shop has bought into the cryptocurrency movement.
In partnership with BitPay, customers can now shop with the e-tailer and select crypto as a payment method, including Bitcoin, Bitcoin Cash, Litecoin, Dogecoin and Ethereum.
“We have been watching the cryptocurrency market grow and develop in the past few years, so now is the perfect time to introduce crypto payments,” says Sanjay Vadera, CEO at The Fragrance Shop.
Homebase has selected RELEX Solutions to automate and optimise its supply chain processes.
RELEX will service Homebase stores across the UK and Ireland, three distribution centres and online, supporting forecasting and replenishment, allocations and promotional forecasting.
InPost UK has announced fashion retailer REVOLVE as an Instant Returns partner.
In a LinkedIn post, InPost says: “The LA-based label is seeing strong growth in the UK market and is on a mission to transform fashion retail for the 21st century.”
“And, as a firm favourite for Millennial and Gen Z shoppers, our paperless, 24/7 returns solution perfectly complements its ambition to redefine the shopping experience.”
To use the service, shoppers need to scan their QR code at an InPost locker and drop their parcel off.
