Innovative formats - digitized 24/7 stores
A new retail format is conquering small spaces: digitized food kiosks that enable round-the-clock shopping seven days a week - and do away with checkouts and staff. There are already numerous pilot projects that could quickly grow.
Cashierless, day and night. More and more grocery retailers are currently gaining initial experience with a new type of store concept: automated mini-markets that operate completely without tills and staff and make shopping possible at any time of day or night - seven days a week. What do companies
companies such as the Schwarz Group, Edeka, Bünting and Migros expect from this? There are many reasons: they range from increased sales through the extension and flexibilization of store opening hours, to local supply in highly frequented city locations or in structurally weak rural regions, to savings on staff costs and store rents.
Just recently, the Edeka Southwest region opened a very similar store together with Deutsche Bahn: the "E24/7". The robotics system is provided by Stuttgart-based start-up Smark, while the ordering terminals are supplied by self-service kiosk specialist PYRAMID. In future, the mini-market will stock up to 800 products - from basic groceries, including chilled products, to drugstore goods. "The new 24/7 store is the first of its kind in our group of companies, and we are planning further locations in various high-frequency locations in the southwest," announces Jürgen Mäder, Managing Director of Edeka Südwest. The E24/7 pilot store is located at the train station in the small Swabian town of Renningen near Leonberg. Smark and PYRAMID are also the technology suppliers for two other automated containers: for "Pick-me 24/7" of the Swiss Tegut parent company Migros and for the newcomer "Typy" in Düsseldorf. The Pick-me prototype has been parked at the charging stations of e-car manufacturer Tesla in Dietikon, Switzerland, since December 2019. Typy was opened in November 2020 in Düsseldorf's Medienhafen. Several more Typy locations are set to open across Germany this year.
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