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Whether you’re dodging Flock cameras on the freeway, ever-listening smartphones in your pocket, or AI bots at the drive-thru, it’s nearly impossible to avoid some type of AI-integrated device these days.
Now it turns out that not even your grocery store is safe, as Instacart increasingly deploys AI smart carts to grocery stores across the United States. In a recent joint press release, Instacart and the Northeastern grocery-chain Weis Markets announced the deployment of AI integrated carts across select Weis locations in Pennsylvania.
Called “Caper Carts,” the proprietary grocery carts are equipped with numerous camera sensors, digital weight scales, a touchscreen, and “location-tracking systems” in order to make “every trip more informed and rewarding.”
“The technology is part of Instacart’s broader approach to Physical AI for grocery, combining edge computing on Caper Carts with cloud AI trained on more than 1.6 billion online grocery orders and a decade of grocery expertise,” the press release chimes.
Basically, the carts track what customers are spending in real-time, bombarding them with ads and eCoupons via the cart’s on-board screen depending on what products they’re nearby in the store.
“Features like the ‘Got everything you need?’ prompt are already showing how real-time, location-aware prompts can influence customer purchasing behavior by driving a nearly one percentage point lift in basket size on average, a strong early signal of what in-store digital engagement can deliver,” the announcement declares.
Caper Carts will also harangue lucky customers to sign up for Weis Rewards, the grocery chain’s customer loyalty system, as well as pester them with features like “Buy It Again,” which “surfaces previously purchased items to help build baskets more efficiently,” according to the release.
Maybe it sounds dystopian, but AI shopping carts are fast becoming the norm for certain stores across the country. As the press release boasts, Instacart has tripled its number of Caper Carts deployments over previous years. Meanwhile, companies like Kroger have explored their own smart-cart options, complete with their own proprietary battery of nauseating AI features nobody asked for.
If they’re anything like previous no-checkout grocery experiments, it’s likely we’ll soon learn about the underpaid gig workers sitting on the other end of each and every Caper Cart camera.
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