Amazon no-checkout grocery store opens to public
The store, located in Seattle, uses cameras and sensors to track which products shoppers remove from the shelves, and which they put back. The store has no cashiers or checkout lines – customers are automatically billed after leaving the store using credit cards on file.
Amazon has been testing the store with its employees since December 2016. Among the challenges it has been working to overcome were correctly identifying individual shoppers, and resolving how to handle issues with items that were moved or left in incorrect locations.
According to Gianna Puerini, vice president of Amazon Go, the store performed well through the test phase. “This technology didn’t exist,” says Puerini during an in-store interview. “It was really advancing the state of the art of computer vision and machine learning.”
The store – which measures about 1800 square feet and is located in an Amazon office building – uses cameras above the shoppers and weight sensors in the shelves to help determine what items shoppers take. To begin shopping, a customer must first scan an Amazon Go smartphone app and pass through a gated turnstile.
Customers do not need their smartphones to actually shop – Amazon’s “Just Walk Out Technology” automatically detects when products are taken from or returned to the shelves and keeps track of them in a virtual cart. When a customer is done shopping, they just leave the store through the gates, at which point Amazon sends them a receipt and charges their Amazon account.
Amazon has not said if or when it will open more such Amazon Go locations. The company also says that it has no plans to add the technology to its larger – and more complex – Whole Foods stores.
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