End of Amazon Go proves that retailers must build fast, learn faster, kill what doesn’t scale

RTIH recently reported the official end of Amazon Go as a store concept. But this isn’t a tech failed story. The tech worked. Shockingly well, in fact, according to Michael Guzzetta, Retail Innovation & Strategy Leader at Cookie Plug San Antonio, and a former H-E-B executive.

In a LinkedIn post, he said: “Walk in. Grab stuff. Walk out. No checkout. No line. Magic! I was always a fan. The problem was everything around the tech. Convenience retail lives on thin margins and small baskets.”

“Saving a customer 20 seconds at checkout sounds great, but it doesn’t pay for dense camera arrays, constant compute, edge cases, shrink, labour, and expensive leases. Cool demo... Brutal P&L. That always felt like a mismatch.”

He added: “Solving for checkout friction when checkout wasn’t the real problem. What is classic Amazon is what happened next. They didn’t cling to the format. They shut it down, kept the learnings, and moved on. Computer vision. Store telemetry. Behavioral data. Licensing the tech instead of running stores. That’s not failure... That’s experimentation with a stop button.”

Emerging technology is all about experimentation and learning, he argues. It takes a lot of moon shots, testing, and knowing when to take the lessons and pivot.

Guzzetta conclused: “Retail history is full of smart ideas that couldn’t outrun unit economics. Amazon Go just happened to be one of the most elegantly engineered examples. Build fast. Learn faster. Kill what doesn’t scale. That part of the story never gets old!”

2026 RTIH Innovation Awards

Physical stores will be a key focus area at the 2026 RTIH Innovation Awards.

The awards will open for entries in April. They celebrate global retail technology innovation in a fast moving omnichannel world.

Our winners will be revealed at the 2026 RTIH Innovation Awards Ceremony, taking place at The HAC in Central London on Thursday, 15th October.

Check out our 2025 winners here.

Our 2025 hall of fame entrants were revealed during a sold out event which took place at The HAC on 16th October and consisted of a drinks reception, three course meal, and awards ceremony presided over by award winning comedian, actress and writer Tiff Stevenson.

In his welcome speech, Scott Thompson, Founder and Editor, RTIH, said: “This is the awards’ fifth year as a physical event. We started off with just 30 people at the South Place Hotel not far from here, then moved to London Bridge Hotel, then The Barbican, and last year RIBA’s HQ in the West End.”

“But I’m conscious of the fact that, to quote the legend that is Taylor Swift, You’re only as hot as your last hit, baby. So, this year we’ve moved to our biggest venue yet, and also pulled in our largest number of entries to date and broken attendance records.”

He added: “This year’s submissions have without doubt been our best yet. To quote one of the judges: The examples of innovative developments across both traditional and digital retail spaces were truly remarkable.”

Congratulations to our winners, and a big thank you to our sponsors, judging panel, the legend that is Tiff Stevenson, and all those who attended our 2025 gathering.