REWE Group CDTO Christoph Eltze: Artificial intelligence revolution has only just begun and wait and see is not a good option

Christoph Eltze, Chief Digital and Technology Officer at German grocery giant, REWE Group, has taken to social media to discuss the AI revolution in the retail space.

In a LinkedIn post, he said: “Is AI revolutionising today's (bricks and mortar) shopping? Since ChatGPT at the latest, there has been a real hype about AI applications.”

“But one in four retailers considers AI to be a trend that will soon be over, according to the results of a Bitkom survey at the end of last year.”

“My assessment: The effects of AI are sometimes overestimated in the short-term, but completely underestimated in the long-term.”

“Artificial intelligence offers numerous opportunities both to support our colleagues in the right places in the store and to continuously develop the shopping experience of our customers. However, we are still in the testing phase industry wide.”

Eltze went on to give various examples of how REWE Group is tapping AI solutions.

The HOLMES tool (Holistic Management of Exceptional Salespattern) is currently helping colleagues in around 100 PENNY stores to find items that are hidden on the shelf or are currently sold out, for example.

Together with tech firm, Catch, it is currently testing a digital shopping companion at the REWE Center in Cologne-Bickendorf. There are shopping carts that are equipped with special tablets.

"Assisted baking" is the name of a solution in which AI supported software uses a camera to record which baked goods are currently being pushed into the oven.

The system recognises around 100 items that it has learned in 300 to 400 baking processes each. Currently, around 600 REWE stores with 1,500 baking chambers are connected.

Both in REWE Pick&Go test stores and in a recently opened PENNY test store in Romania, customers' purchases can be recorded securely and in a data saving manner using camera and sensor technology and automatically settled after leaving the store without the checkout process.

In cooperation with startups, LastMile and Clevon, it is testing autonomous vehicles in Lithuania IKI.

Eltze concluded: “My assessment: the revolution has only just begun. Therefore, it is important to keep at it, develop and test. "Wait and See" is not a good strategy for us. Because we want to help shape the purchasing of tomorrow.”