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Amazon’s Cashierless Store Is Almost Ready for Prime Time

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Re: Amazon’s Cashierless Store Is Almost Ready for Prime Time

#61

Post by WalterBright »

Navarr wrote: post #58
WalterBright wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When I was a military brat, my mom would shop at the base PX. Children without military ID were not allowed in the PX unless they stayed in the baby seat in the grocery cart. Children could get a military ID at age 10. So up until 10 I sat outside the PX waiting for her to finish shopping. (Getting the ID was great, we could get on the base by ourselves with them. We'd ride our bikes out to the Air Force base and han…

I accompanied my grandfather into a PX and never had that issue - even as a teenager, no military ID.

Maybe the rule was at the discretion of the base commander. Also, I'm talking about the 60's and 70's, things may have changed.

Re: Amazon’s Cashierless Store Is Almost Ready for Prime Time

#62

Post by spectrum1234 »

tarboreus wrote: post #12

You know what I find convenient? Cash. You just take it out of your wallet and hand it over in exchange for goods. No tracking, no receipt emails, no machine learning of my behavior to figure out when my partner is pregnant or whatever, no extra apps, no facial recognition, no 2-4% charge for businesses that only doesn't apply if you're an international monopoly. Oh, my phone is out of batteries. Guess I'll just give…

2% back on all purchase with a Fidelity credit card though. I'll take my 98% cost of everything ever over cash any day.

Re: Amazon’s Cashierless Store Is Almost Ready for Prime Time

#63

Post by dannyw »

cardamomo wrote: post #23

> Engineers are also figuring out which person to charge when a couple goes shopping together. This made me giggle. I've tried to figure out the same thing myself when shopping with a significant other or close friend. I'm having a hard time imagining how this would be cast as an engineering problem.

A “split the bill” function in your receipt?

Re: Amazon’s Cashierless Store Is Almost Ready for Prime Time

#64

Post by Navarr »

WalterBright wrote: post #61
Navarr wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I accompanied my grandfather into a PX and never had that issue - even as a teenager, no military ID.

Maybe the rule was at the discretion of the base commander. Also, I'm talking about the 60's and 70's, things may have changed.

Yeah this was 90s/00s. Bragg.

Re: Amazon’s Cashierless Store Is Almost Ready for Prime Time

#65

Post by brownbat »

My pain point isn't checkout, it's wandering around a store and dodging large carts in narrow aisles. Maybe they'll tackle that next.

I really wish Amazon would let me put dry and frozen goods in an app, then have kiva robots fetch those while I just browse produce. Like, you could leave the produce section normal, people freak about produce, but make the rest of the store a robot filled warehouse that customers don't even enter.

Re: Amazon’s Cashierless Store Is Almost Ready for Prime Time

#66

Post by harryh »

brownbat wrote: post #65

My pain point isn't checkout, it's wandering around a store and dodging large carts in narrow aisles. Maybe they'll tackle that next. I really wish Amazon would let me put dry and frozen goods in an app, then have kiva robots fetch those while I just browse produce. Like, you could leave the produce section normal, people freak about produce, but make the rest of the store a robot filled warehouse that customers don'…

People spend more money when they spend time wandering around the rest of the store.

Re: Amazon’s Cashierless Store Is Almost Ready for Prime Time

#67

Post by rtpg »

Simon_says wrote: post #56
rtpg wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This works less well with other currencies If you're working with euros your largest denomination coin is 2€ . In Yen it's 500 yen! This is not chump change and just throwing those coins into the charity box can leave you with effectively increasing your lunch pricing by 50% if you have a "give all coins to charity" policy. If you have the cash for it more power to you, of course.

Who said anything about charity?

Ah, I think I misread the original comment to be something like "drop the coins in the tip jar". Please disregard.

Re: Amazon’s Cashierless Store Is Almost Ready for Prime Time

#68

Post by pwinnski »

justonepost wrote: post #20
sschueller wrote: post #7

What if I don't have an Amazon account? Can I even enter the store?

Very likely no. Much like costco, I suspect.

One person in a group must wave around a Costco card for the entire group to enter.

I wonder if I would be allowed to grocery shop as I do now, with my adult daughter who doesn't have an Amazon account of her own.

Re: Amazon’s Cashierless Store Is Almost Ready for Prime Time

#69

Post by pwinnski »

perseusprime11 wrote: post #52

I still dont see anyone in Amazon Bookstores. Expecting them to close soon. Why is there so much fascination to reinvent physical stores when we are perfectly happy to get stuff delivered to our homes.

In October 2017, an estimated $486.6 billion in sales took place at retail stores in the U.S.

For e-commerce, the total for the entire three-month quarter was $115.3 billion.

[0] https://www.census.gov/retail/

Re: Amazon’s Cashierless Store Is Almost Ready for Prime Time

#70

Post by tarboreus »

mixedCase wrote: post #44
tarboreus wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I personally love $5 and $10 bills. I frequently do exact change when I have a bunch of those. Buying a BLT at the bodega? That's $5.75 with a coke. Here's $6. At the end of the day, I fire my change in a bucket and bring it to a machine once a year to get exchanged. Also, taking out $100 in 2017 is silly, at least if you spend more than $200 a week, which is most non-students here. I just get out the max that the AT…

If fewer people carry cash around, there's less of an incentive to mug people for their cash.

This is strictly true, but IMO a better argument against iPhones than against cash.
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