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Kroger acknowledges that its bet on robotics went too far

grocerydive.com

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Re: Kroger acknowledges that its bet on robotics went too far

#71

Post by vkou »

markus_zhang wrote: post #25

I had a wonderful retro futuristic dream about an automated Costco warehouse a few weeks ago. It was one of the less weird dreams so I still remember it clearly. Basically, each section is like a closed areas with some windows. Customers order at the computers by the windows and flash their membership cards. Robots glide left and right to move 10 samples to the customer, in an arm with rotating clips. Customers can p…

You've reinvented the Soviet grocery store, but with robots instead of people and with a $7 cup of coffee.

Re: Kroger acknowledges that its bet on robotics went too far

#72

Post by mlrtime »

aerostable_slug wrote: post #10
recursive wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I like being able to see the thing I'm going to get and holding it in my hand.

I like not going to the store more. Because tips are important to the income of delivery shoppers, I find that I generally get good produce selections. It might be difficult to transition that particular incentive to robots, but the point is that delivery items don't have to suck. The only thing I really still pick out by hand every time are beef briskets. Pork shoulders tend to be uniform enough that randomly pickin…

>Because tips are important to the income of delivery shoppers, I find that I generally get good produce selections

Wait, you tip to get a good selection of produce to be delivered to you? This is very bizarre to me.

Re: Kroger acknowledges that its bet on robotics went too far

#73

Post by markus_zhang »

vkou wrote: post #71
markus_zhang wrote: post #25

I had a wonderful retro futuristic dream about an automated Costco warehouse a few weeks ago. It was one of the less weird dreams so I still remember it clearly. Basically, each section is like a closed areas with some windows. Customers order at the computers by the windows and flash their membership cards. Robots glide left and right to move 10 samples to the customer, in an arm with rotating clips. Customers can p…

You've reinvented the Soviet grocery store, but with robots instead of people and with a $7 cup of coffee.

I remember those stores as I came from a similar background. One vital difference is that they all have workers who have a straight face and don’t give it a fuck about customer service.

Then in the 90s they were all washed away by the new ones.

Re: Kroger acknowledges that its bet on robotics went too far

#74

Post by monero-xmr »

mosura wrote: post #3

Sounds like they just put them in the wrong places. > Fenyo added that Kroger’s decision to locate the Ocado centers outside of cities turned out to be a key flaw. > “Ultimately those were hard places to make this model work,” said Fenyo. “You didn’t have enough people ordering, and you had a fair amount of distance to drive to get the orders to them. And so ultimately, these large centers were just not processing en…

“Never underestimate the bandwidth of a station wagon full of tapes hurtling down the highway”

In the AI analogy, never underestimate the productivity of a human when dealing with a giant pile of groceries. You can throw all the AI and robots you can at something but sometimes a $20 an hour human picking from stacks of goods and produce simply destroys it in raw economics

Re: Kroger acknowledges that its bet on robotics went too far

#75

Post by Animats »

markus_zhang wrote: post #25

I had a wonderful retro futuristic dream about an automated Costco warehouse a few weeks ago. It was one of the less weird dreams so I still remember it clearly. Basically, each section is like a closed areas with some windows. Customers order at the computers by the windows and flash their membership cards. Robots glide left and right to move 10 samples to the customer, in an arm with rotating clips. Customers can p…

What you've re-invented is Keydoozle, from 1937.[1] This was the first automated grocery store. Three stores were opened, but there were enough mechanical problems that it didn't work well.

[1] https://rarehistoricalphotos.com/keedoozle-automated-store-p...

Re: Kroger acknowledges that its bet on robotics went too far

#76

Post by SoftTalker »

alphabettsy wrote: post #66
AngryData wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Probably because you then need pillars throughout the entire building to support the second floor which you are loading down with a ton of weight. The average forklift weighs 3x or more the weight of the average car, and then adding racking and stock on top of that. Yeah if you completely redesign your storage system to not require forklifts you save weight there, but you end up adding the weight back with all the he…

Then put the warehouse on the first floor and put the store on top. Lots of big cities have grocery stores with parking garages under them, doesn’t seem much different.

Inner city high rise construction is entirely different from tip-up and bolt together single-story box stores in the suburbs.

Re: Kroger acknowledges that its bet on robotics went too far

#77

Post by Animats »

jlarocco wrote: post #17
mosura wrote: post #3

Sounds like they just put them in the wrong places. > Fenyo added that Kroger’s decision to locate the Ocado centers outside of cities turned out to be a key flaw. > “Ultimately those were hard places to make this model work,” said Fenyo. “You didn’t have enough people ordering, and you had a fair amount of distance to drive to get the orders to them. And so ultimately, these large centers were just not processing en…

But I think in the cities Kroger grocery stores serve as the fulfilment centers, so they don't need robotic ones. There's probably still room for automation, but it might have to be different than warehouse automation.

Using a retail store for fulfillment means orders are accepted for items that are out of stock. the ordering system doesn't have reliable inventory info. Then the customer gets a partial shipment. This is the curse of Safeway grocery ordering.

Re: Kroger acknowledges that its bet on robotics went too far

#78

Post by SoftTalker »

markbao wrote: post #16
liquidise wrote: post #5

Good news for blue collar workers, tough for investors. The bean-counting dream of LLM's and Robotics remains, but until ChatGPT is placing your order at Mcdonalds drive-thrus and Amazon is laying off warehouse associates en masse, i'd say that last 5% is still taking 95% of the time.

McDonald’s is an interesting example because they’re increasingly replacing cashiers with kiosks. Robotics/LLMs seem to have diminishing returns compared to that in the order taking realm.

Yeah the introduction of the kiosks is what tipped the scale and stopped me going to McDonalds. And I used to eat there a couple of times a week at least.

Re: Kroger acknowledges that its bet on robotics went too far

#79

Post by pirate787 »

markus_zhang wrote: post #25

I had a wonderful retro futuristic dream about an automated Costco warehouse a few weeks ago. It was one of the less weird dreams so I still remember it clearly. Basically, each section is like a closed areas with some windows. Customers order at the computers by the windows and flash their membership cards. Robots glide left and right to move 10 samples to the customer, in an arm with rotating clips. Customers can p…

That was Best store in the 1980s

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Best_Products

Re: Kroger acknowledges that its bet on robotics went too far

#80

Post by adolph »

mlrtime wrote: post #69
da02 wrote: post #12

Here in the Houston areas, supermarkets like Kroger/Walmart/HEB/etc always have single floor buildings. Why can't they build multi-floor buildings for storage upstairs and retail walk-in sales on the ground floor? On the above ground floors, they can create an automated or semi-automated system for employees to gather up items for online/delivery orders.

I thought about this a lot with parking spaces, nobody like big, open, tree-less parking lots. Why not just build them up adjacent to the grocery store. The answer is $. It costs too much and land is cheaper than building up (In most places).

All recent HEBs have dedicated grocery pickup staging space. I chatted with a staffer once. It is like its own little grocery store where they keep selections of hot, cold and room temperature bags of selected groceries temperature controlled until the orderer comes and they put them together and bring them out.

The ones in Bellaire and Meyerland are two level with parking (aka flooding space) below the store and a smaller parking lot on the second level with the store. Bellaire also has a fancy fuel cell setup for some reason. The single level HEB in Montrose(ish) was built into the site of an old complex of charming but nearly abandoned standalone quad/duplexes with many mature oaks. They seem to have retained nearly all of the trees on the grounds in greenspaces within the parking lot and entryway.

Here's some street view of Montrose. They also had a bike air and repair system when it opened. I'm not certain if it stayed in good repair itself. https://maps.app.goo.gl/KxHAvDqKca4E8L8a7

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