If you have seen it already Amazon announced recently that they have a physical store where people can do their grocery shopping without any line ups. Through various sensors and other tech stuff apparently you could literally just take the item off the shelf as if you were taking something out of like your home refrigerator and then just go. Supposedly everything is wired to know exactly what you take where everything will then be automatically billed into your account.
The reactions I have been hearing are kind of interesting from a business point of view. From the people I know the interesting thing was how many people expressed how it will be great to not have to deal with anyone, including staff members. That made me think as usually in a retail store things like customer service is a key to bringing people back. That can range from being greeted by happy associates or having someone there help you with your purchase questions. Kind of made me wonder, would you rather trade that all away for the sake of having a faster purchasing experience?
I know for myself I usually use the self-checkouts at supermarkets nowadays whenever I have like an item or two. Though sometimes the lines are longer due to people struggling to ring in the orders by themselves. It kind of contradicts a lot of traditional retail store strategies to compete with online vendors too where one key I often heard is that many companies are trying to use human interaction as the key to bringing people back. This should make you re-think that.
Although, I would probably be more excited for when the day comes that we can just choose what we want and have like a drone deliver it to you.