What to expect from the low-cost grocery store of Amazon – Quartz

A few years ago, people would have laughed if you told them that Amazon would open physical stores.

That's because a false story had solidified: Walmart represented the old brick and mortar and Amazon represented the power of online shopping. These were their ways; all we had to do was wait to see which model survived the other.

Amazon is breaking this story. In the past two years, he has acquired the Whole Foods supermarket chain; and open Amazon brand bookstores, ephemeral e-mail stores and even retail spaces without cashiers.

Now, the company wants to build its own grocery stores, really putting itself in the place of the pillars of the company. Shares of Amazon's future competitors – Walmart, Kroger, Target, BJs, Costco and Sprouts – fell by more than 1% Friday (March 1) following a Wall Street Journal (paywall) article on its ambitions in the field of groceries.

But it's a potentially exciting new for consumers. Amazon has the opportunity to totally reinvent and set new standards for what people expect when they buy food products, says Phil Lempert, an American expert in the retail product and services sector. 39; deli.

"It's a very good idea, but to be successful, Amazon has to create great experiences," says Lempert, who sees Amazon's arrival in the grocery store as obvious.

Research shows Gen X and Baby Boomer place a high value on shopping at home, but 75% of Millennials and Generation Z buyers prefer to leave their homes and shop for experiences interesting.

"They will spend time looking for a product online, but this generation of buyers wants to see, touch and try the item before making a purchase," reads in a report published in 2018 by Synchrony, a consumer studies company based in Connecticut.

In the same way that Nike has reinvented and reinvigorated clothing purchases, Seattle-based Amazon has a chance to impress its grocery store worldview. This has already been done largely in general retail sales with its small batch of Amazon Go stores, which do not have cash. Buyers can simply come and go under the watchful eye of high tech camera systems, which identify what people are taking and what to charge. A few seconds after leaving the store, a receipt sent by email arrives in the customer's inbox.

Lempert said he could imagine stylish screens and mirrors in Amazon's new supermarkets, with which consumers could interact. Imagine holding an apple on the screen and retrieving all sorts of information: the apple's provenance, nutritional value, and relevant apple recipes. One could imagine different ways for Amazon to integrate an application to its store experience.

In fact, bringing a new look to the grocery store is not a particularly difficult task. Lempert points out that, historically, the industry has not attached much importance to in-store experiences. "I think the experiences in these stores come and go in the aisles and the discovery of 50,000 products," he says, "49,920 that you do not want." This leaves a lot of room for innovation.