Lowe's introduces autonomous service robots to retail stores

Robots are increasingly common in warehouses and stores. Now Lowe's will start rolling out autonomous retail service robots that can help manage inventory and show customers where to find products.

By Kelly McSweeney for Robotics | August 31, 2016 -- 20:23 GMT (13:23 PDT) | Topic: Robotics

Image: Fellow Robots

Ecommerce companies already use robots for materials transport and picking orders , but brick-and-mortar stores don't want to be left out of the automation trend. Now Lowe's joins the growing list of retailers that are using artificial intelligence to help with both logistics and customer service. The home improvement store will start rolling out autonomous retail service robots to 11 California stores over the next seven months.

Lowe's partnered with Silicon Valley technology firm Fellow Robots to develop LoweBot, a 5-foot-tall NAVii machine that can navigate itself through store aisles while avoiding obstacles. The two companies have previously worked together to develop a similar robot that has been tested for the last two years in Orchard Supply Hardware, a chain owned by Lowe's.

At first, the robot seems like it's just a novelty designed to draw people into stores. (And that is probably at least partially true.) However, it's more complicated than a self-service kiosk. Much like human employees, it will greet customers, ask if they need help finding anything in the store, and then walk them to the correct location. The robot uses a 3D scanner for human body frame detection, and it engages with customers through speech recognition and a screen that displays detailed product information. It's not clear whether Lowe's will make its robots multi-lingual, but NAVii robots can be programmed to understand as many as 25 languages.

It can also scan inventory on the shelves and remember inventory details on a daily basis. Lowe's plans to use the data the robot collects to help the company find and detect inventory patterns that can influence business decisions.

Image: Fellow Robots

Marco Mascorro, co-founder and CEO of Fellow Robots, tells ZDNet:

We develop technology that is scalable, which is the number one pain point for bringing new technology into the retail channel. Our robotic and software platform is robust enough to manage the complex and large inventory that these retailers have, and we work closely with our partners to understand their use case to tailor our offering. Our goal is to solve the biggest challenges our clients face, like checking inventory and customer service, while also having the ability to react and make quick iterations to our system to fulfill the unique needs of our partners.

According to a Deloitte report on 2016 retail trends, robots are increasingly common in warehouses and stores. In addition to using automated machines behind the scenes, retailers are introducing robotic shopping carts and customer-facing robots.

Robots have recently appeared in stores such as Target and Best Buy, and SoftBank's humanoid Pepper -- which has been popular in Japan -- made its North American debut this summer.

Kroger's Stealth Battle

• Published on August 30, 2016

Gary Hawkins

Leading shopper-focused retail innovation

There have been numerous stories in the press over the past few days talking about a new round of fierce price competition as big retailers lower prices in hopes of driving top line sales. One of the articles — “Kroger is taking drastic measures to slash prices — and Walmart should be terrified” [Business Insider, Aug. 26, 2016] reported that the company recently cut prices on 1,000 popular products in over 100 of its stores and is hiring an additional 14,000 people to increase customer service at its 2,800 stores.

Cutting prices while increasing overhead is a recipe for disaster at most retailers. But Kroger is waging a different fight. And what scares me is how few retailers and wholesalers understand what is going on.

Kroger is lowering prices to bolster the value provided to its existing customers, helping insure customer retention. But the company is also lowering prices to attract more customers to its doors… and feed the powerful customer-fueled growth machine Kroger has built over the past decade.

Over a dozen years ago, Kroger’s then CEO David Dillon launched the company’s Customer First initiative, believing that by truly putting the customer at the center of all activities that customers would, in turn, reward Kroger with more business. Kroger has integrated the intelligent use of customer data into merchandising decisions, promotion planning, pricing, and many other operational areas. A key part of the initiative is the use of precision promotion targeting to strategically acquire, grow, and retain customers… one at a time. 

As loyalty advocates know, higher spending customers are more more profitable, providing a higher gross margin to the retailer than lower spending customers. Kroger has significantly grown the number of premium loyal customers over the years using precision promotion targeting. That change in sales mix has resulted in growing margins - that Kroger has strategically reinvested in lowering prices and strengthening customer service. 

Here’s the beauty of Kroger’s strategy: Competing retailers fail to see what’s happening because Kroger’s share-of-wallet strategy is stealth marketing at its finest, executed via direct mail and digital channels. As Kroger grows spending from it’s customers by siphoning visits from competing retailers those competitors are left with lower spending, less profitable customers. In the face of faltering sales, competitors typically increase promotional activity, putting more downward pressure on margins. Instead of Kroger’s upward spiral of value creation, competing retailers often find themselves on a downward spiral, the opposite of Kroger.

And for those retailers who sit back thinking they are safe because Kroger is not in their market I have bad news. Kroger’s success has not gone unnoticed by other Tier 1 retailers; companies like Albertsons / Safeway, CVS, Walgreens, Target, and even Walmart, are aggressively seeking to collect and use customer data in similar fashion. And don’t forget the big CPG brands who have realized that precision targeted promotions produce better results than traditional mass trade promotion.

Kroger’s stealth battle for customer share-of-wallet has quietly opened a new front in retail competition and far too many retailers and wholesalers fail to understand that competition has fundamentally changed. It’s a new world and the strategic use of customer intelligence is the advanced weaponry for today’s retail competition.

City Gardens Are All the Rage

Urban agriculture is quickly replacing them

August 31, 2016, 11:25 am

City gardens add beauty, aromas, a sense of community and oxygen to a neighborhood. But the truth is, from an environmental standpoint, they are very wasteful.  The EPA estimates that Americans use 9 billion gallons of water each and every day, simply to keep their personal outdoor landscapes looking green, and that does not include any municipal usage – a cost borne by taxpayers. 

Which is why urban agriculture is quickly replacing those green lawns and flowers in our cities' common areas and transforming them into productive edible gardens that are open to the public or designed to benefit specific social service or nonprofit groups, according to earth911 and it’s happening around the world. 

Andernach, Germany, is known as The Edible City, due to its commitment to planting fruits and vegetables on city land, rather than flowers. This initiative officially began in 2010, and has worked to transform over 86,000 square feet of city property into lush vegetable gardens filled with nutrient-rich fruits and vegetables. And they are creatively keeping their neighbors involved - planting hundreds of heirloom varieties of tomatoes one year for example, so the public could see and taste the differences between plant types. 

In London, there is The Edible Bus Stop. This group works to change drab, dull and depressing urban spaces with bursts of color and fresh fruit and veggies. As the name would suggest, one of its first projects was to transform three bus stops along the number 322 bus route in London into edible gardens. 

Victoria, British Columbia, has transformed part of a public square into a food-producing space, and, partnering with Our Place Society, plants, maintains and harvests vegetables and herbs to make meals for its lunch program. Seedlings will be provided by the city and will include oregano, kale, rainbow chard, broccoli, basil, dill, red cabbage, cucumbers and tomatoes. Sunflowers will be planted to provide color and food in the garden. Existing plants in the edible garden include large artichokes, fig trees, goumi berries, chives and thyme, and all the produce will be harvested and donated to the Our Place Society, an organization that serves the poor, disadvantaged and homeless population of the city.   

That's urban gardening with a purpose that goes well beyond beautification.

Truck-involved fatalities increased 4.4 percent in 2015, DOT says

Truck-involved crashes resulting in fatalities increased by 4.4 percent in 2015 from 2014, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s final 2015 fatalities report released this week.

NHTSA’s report says there were 4,067 truck-involved fatalities, which is the highest number since 2008. Of the 4,067 fatalities, 667 (16.4 percent) were occupants of the trucks, 10.1 percent were non-occupants and 73.5 percent were occupants of other vehicles. NHTSA’s report doesn’t account for crash fault.

In total, there were 35,092 people killed in crashes in the U.S. in 2015, a 7.2 percent increase from 2014, which is the largest increase in highway fatalities since 1966, according to NHTSA. There was also a significant increase in the number of people injured in crashes in 2015, rising from 2.34 million in 2014 to 2.44 million in 2015, NHTSA’s report states. These numbers are lower than NHTSA predicted in its preliminary report released in July.

NHTSA report shows increase in truck-related fatalities in 2015

Overall, NHTSA found a 7.7 percent increase in traffic deaths during 2015. An estimated 35,200 people died on U.S. roadways in 2015, up from the ...

A 3.5 percent increase in vehicle miles traveled is one contributing factor to the rise in highway fatalities, NHTSA says. The fatality rate per 100 million vehicle miles traveled increased 3.7 percent to 1.12 in 2015.

Crashes resulting in fatalities caused by driver distraction increased from 3,197 to 3,477, or 8.8 percent, in 2015 from 2014. Alcohol-impaired fatalities increased by 3.2 percent, speeding-related fatalities increased by 3 percent and drowsy-driving fatalities decreased by 3.2 percent.

“The data tell us that people die when they drive drunk, distracted or drowsy, or if they are speeding or unbuckled,” said NHTSA Administrator Dr. Mark Rosekind. “While there have been enormous improvements in many of these areas, we need to find new solutions to end traffic fatalities.”

E-commerce accounts for 7% of retail sales in France

 BY ALLISON ENRIGHT Editor

Online sales in France increased 16% in 2015, and Amazon.com is the most popular online retailer.

The 35.5 million French consumers who shop online bought 71.3 billion euros ($79.8 billion at today’s exchange rate) worth of goods last year, up 16.1% from 61.4 billion ($68.7 billion) euros the prior year, according to figures from Fevad, an e-commerce trade group in France. Fevad includes online travel purchases in its calculations for retail e-commerce.

The average French online shopper completed 22.9 online transactions in 2015, and the average order value was 78 euros ($87). Further, a growing proportion of these sales are taking place on smartphones and tablets. Mobile transactions accounted for 9% of total e-commerce sales, up from 7.5% in 2014 and 4.3% in 2013, according to the group.

Also inching up is the percentage of purchases being made on online marketplaces. Fevad estimates French consumers made 9% of their online purchases on marketplaces last year, up from 8% in 2014 and 7% in 2013. It estimates 34% of French consumers made at least one purchase on a marketplace in the first six months of 2016.

Tellingly, three of the five most-visited e-commerce sites in France have a marketplace. Amazon.com Inc., Cdiscount.com (Cnova NV/Groupe Casino) andeBay Inc. all operate marketplaces. Amazon.fr is the most-visited e-commerce site, Cdiscount.com is second and eBay is fourth.

Amazon.fr gets the most unique visitors per month—18.1 million—and has the greatest reach with French consumers. Fevad estimates 37.9% of French web users visit Amazon.fr in a month. Amazon is No. 1 in the Internet Retailer Europe 500, which ranks the 500 largest e-retailers operating in Europe, based on their web sales.

Cdiscount, owned by Groupe Casino and No. 17 in the Europe 500, gets 11.2 million unique visitors a month and reaches 23.4% of French internet users. Rounding out the top five are retail chain Fnac, No. 106 in the Europe 500, eBay and Voyage SNCF, the ticketing company for France’s railroads.

American malls are dying faster than you think — and it's about to get even worse

• Ashley Lutz
 

Shoppers at a mall in Troy, Michigan. Joshua Lott/Getty Images

America's most iconic retailers are closing stores, and it's left many speculating about the future of shopping malls.

Macy's recently announced it is closing 100 stores, following similar announcements from Sears, Gap, and Abercrombie & Fitch.

The decline in traffic has been stunning: In 2010, there were 35 million visits to malls, according to the real-estate research firm Cushman and Wakefield. By 2013, there were 17 million visits — a 50% decline.

Analysts expect upcoming data will show an even steeper drop in mall traffic.

"The shift in how people are shopping means the future of retail fulfillment is no longer just about more stores or shopping centers," Cushman and Wakefield analysts wrote, adding that stores would need to invest in online options.

About 15% of malls will disappear in the next decade, according to a study by Green Street Advisors.

There are numerous reasons for the brick-and-mortar apparel industry's decline.

Americans are increasingly choosing to spend on technology and experiences like vacations, leaving less money for apparel. This has led to a spike in discount retailers like TJ Maxx. When people do shop at traditional full-price retailers, they increasingly prefer to do so online.

Moody's Investors Service says that closing stores is a necessary step for Macy's.

The defunct Rolling Acres Mall in Akron, Ohio. Nicholas Eckhart

"Macy's can be more malleable in its effort to meet the changing needs of the consumer and focus its effort on stores which are better gatekeepers of its brand image," Moody's analysts wrote in a recent report. "It will also free up internal resources in efforts to grow in higher-growth areas."

But fewer "anchor stores" in malls also spells even more trouble for specialty stores like Gap and Abercrombie & Fitch. Many Americans visit a mall intending to go to department stores, then stop in other stores once they're there.

Once mall anchors like Macy's close, it could be difficult for owners to find tenants to replace them, said Howard Davidowitz, chairman of Davidowitz & Associates, a national retail-consulting and investment-banking firm.

"Teen retailers ... are all a disaster, and these middle-level malls are killing them," Davidowitz said.

There is a bright spot for the malls, at least those catering to high-end shoppers, according to The Wall Street Journal: technology-focused tenants like Tesla, Microsoft, and Apple.

Because technology is more expensive than clothing, it's easier for these stores to turn a profit. Technology stores also require fewer staff members and smaller spaces than department stores, resulting in fewer overhead expenses.

Restaurants of the future could be run almost entirely by robots

• Chris Weller
  

Skye Gould/Business Insider

It must have seemed like a revolutionary idea to diners of the 1920s — people on roller skates delivering food straight to their driver's side window.

Suddenly, the food that families were used to eating around a dinner table now arrived on trays or in bags, ready to be eaten on the go. Little did they know fast food was on the brink of explosion.

Nearly 100 years later, restaurants are on the brink of another massive change: robot automation.

The best estimates find that up to 50% of jobs could be automated by the late 2030s, with restaurant workers among the most vulnerable to displacement.

Some locations have already started moving away from human labor in an effort to cut operating costs. In its place, they've started relying on machines that are getting more sophisticated every day. Within the next 20 years, experts say, nearly every restaurant job once held by humans could get passed on to robots.

"A lot of what's done in restaurants is already automated," Rebecca Chesney, research and partnerships manager at the Institute for the Future, tells Business Insider. "Today's robotics can actually mimic human gestures that you'd need for cooking, for instance, way more than they could years ago."

Is the best chef a robot?

Chesney points to Momentum Machines, the company perhaps most poised to shake up the way food is prepared.

In 2014, the company released a device that essentially worked like a printing press for hamburgers. The robot pressed patties, chopped toppings, and assembled the ingredients into a sumptuous-looking sandwich. Momentum Machines went quiet for the next two years, but earlier this June the company posted a Craigslist ad looking for employees in the San Francisco area for a restaurant opening this fall.

"This location will feature the world-premiere of our proprietary and remarkable new advances in technology that enable the automatic creation of impossibly delicious burgers at prices everyone can afford," according to the ad.

A schematic for the Momentum Machines prototype, which can crank out 400 burgers an hour. Momentum Machines

As Xconomy reported, Momentum Machines' prototype could replace two to three line cooks — a savings of roughly $90,000 a year counting salaries and overhead costs. In turn, customers get perfectly-made burgers every single time.

Momentum Machines may be the most restaurant-ready system for food preparation, but it's by no means the only one. Other robots can already prepare sushi, make pizza, mix cocktails,slice noodles, and griddle pancakes.

In the future, these minds of technologies could all live under one roof.

Robots everywhere, no servers in sight

Moving from the kitchen to the front of the house, Chesney says restaurants are also looking to automate how food reaches customers.

Take Eatsa, another San Francisco-based restaurant, which has automated the way people order and pick up their food, much like the automats of the early 20th century that essentially functioned as vending machines for entire meals.

Justin Sullivan/Getty

Instead of talking to a cashier to order their quinoa bowls, Eatsa diners build their meals on touch screens and pick them up from windows. There are no chefs or servers in sight.

Chesney says places like Eatsa and companies like Momentum Machines are strong signals for where fast food is heading because people crave speed and low cost — two qualities that human-run restaurants can't offer the way robot-powered restaurants can.

A future of personalized ambience

Not every restaurant will necessarily go full-robot, says Sarah Smith, a researcher at IFTF's Food Futures Lab, who works alongside Chesney. Fine-dining restaurants depend on people feeling comfortable, not rushed. And robots don't tend to inspire a warm, inviting feeling.

But fine-dining is still ripe for automation behind the scenes.

"Maybe they'll focus still on making the food by hand and focusing on quality ingredients," Smith says, "but there could be parts of the experience that could have some level of automation."

Reuters/Stringer

For instance, both she and Chesney suspect the psychological research into how people eat and enjoy food will get put to good use, as restaurants use automation to change lighting, temperatures, noise levels, and scents. Just as musicians can fit their fans with heart rate monitors to create the perfect concert, restaurant owners could use biometric data to make sure people eat in just the right conditions.

At the extreme might be restaurants that leverage the technology created by Project Nourished, a company that uses virtual reality to simulate just about every food experience imaginable.

Diners in Oculus Rift headsets can eat vegan gelatin that has been infused with the flavors of wasabi and ginger, while a machine pumps the room with a whiff of seafood, so that when you look through the goggles, you fully believe you're eating the sushi sitting in front of you.

Oculus VR / Facebook

Making good on their promise

Together, these changes add up to a set of dining experiences that embody what restaurants have always tried to be.

Restaurants give people a better alternative to preparing their own (often ordinary) food in their own (often limited) time. If they're automated, either in preparation, delivery, or ambience, they stand a better chance at guaranteeing a good experience for diners — even if that means huge swaths of employees risk losing their jobs.

The future is a far cry from carhops.