There's a video in that article too and it shows the stupidity of this design better..
So the transparent doors are now giant screens that show video ads all over them until you're in front of it.
When you're in front of it, it shows all the stuff it may have inside.
The "may" is where the really stupid part of this tech comes into play -- the screen shows what is available on a fully stocked shelf but when you open it to look inside, you can see there may be entire rows/products that aren't in stock (as seen in some customer videos in the article).
I know some people like the “low distraction” of something like CNN’s lite mode but I hate it. Since there are no pictures I can’t see what they’re talking about, and that’s often important for the story (like here).
An ad blocker serves me just fine. Or I could turn on reader mode in my browser. Either way I still get the pictures. And they’re important to me.
This version is much better. Should have been the OP link. Honestly it doesn’t look terrible from a UX perspective while it’s working. Pointless maybe, but it’s much better than some displays I have seen which don’t show all the products on screen at once.
>The screens, which were developed by the startup Cooler Screens, use a system of motion sensors and cameras to display what's inside the doors — as well as product information, prices, deals and, most appealing to brands, paid advertisements. The tech provides stores with an additional revenue stream and a way to modernize the shopping experience.
I really hate the trend of putting "smart" screens and networked ads everywhere. Those startup bros can go jump off a cliff with their trash ideas.
Is it really so hard for retailers to stick to their core competencies and keep the transaction simple between us? I give them money, they give me goods/services. No need to get random middlemen involved.
If they were just adding screens that created a new means of interacting, that would be much less infuriating. What makes to so bad is the removal of the standard means of interaction, forcing everyone to use the screens whether they want to or not.
If I see these color door screens someplace, I am simple going to walk out and refuse to give that store any business. I refuse to support companies that are actively trying to make my life harder.
I don't walk out. I make a point to open the doors as hard as I can to get them jammed open or bend the hinges a bit. I've managed to break one or two so far.
What proof is there that whoever wrote the comment actually did it? Besides, if they can be broken merely by being opened and closed hard, they aren’t going to stay long anyway.
This already is a core grocery competency. Did you think that the shelf placement of goods was chosen on a whim? Every shelf is a billboard where prime placement is auctioned off to the highest bidder.
Digital shelves are still stupid as all hell, but strictly from a KISS perspective, not a business one. The fact that this approach is so conceptually similar to existing SOP is probably why so many big grocers are getting swindled by this "innovation".
I've been at a store that used this technology and it was obnoxious. I really don't see how it will catch on or survive in the real world. The cost to run these screens 24/7 is enormous, especially in a world where energy costs are increasing. I doubt the ad revenue they make will come anywhere near recouping the costs after the honeymoon period and investor cash runs out.
It's not just the energy cost, but also the classic problem with IoT: is the company willing to stay on top of security patches and maintain the underlying software? If not, then it's only a matter of time before the software is either abandoned by the company rendering the screens useless, or compromised by hackers to display beheading videos all over the frozen foods aisle.
> is the company willing to stay on top of security patches and maintain the underlying software?
It is much worse than that. Even companies willing to stay on top have trouble, can be affected by zero days, data leaks, and eventually stop supporting their hardware.
Besides the annoying reality of not being able to see stock levels on product, when the screens go out (they do), you can't see what's in the cooler without opening the door.
A solution looking for a problem for sure. Maybe next they'll try one of those fancy transparent OLED panels and run ads on it!
It certainly feels like a solution looking for a problem from the customer's perspective, but I wonder whether it is actually worthwhile from an advertising perspective. Perhaps the aggravation to customers costs less money than the revenue of new sales that wouldn't have happened without a giant display advertising to people on the other side of the store.
Bingo. Companies of this size don't make these investments without a crystal clear business model. So while Joe consumer and most of HN decides this tech, I assure you that Walgreens has increased profits by a meaningful amount as a result of this investment.
They were investing in Theranos right before this, and they're undergoing a massive shrinkage right now. Forgive me if I don't innately trust Walgreen's business savvy at the moment.
I have the feeling that we reached or surpassed "peak retail pharmacy" at some point, but they aren't ready to admit it, so they're going on random tech benders hoping to appear relevant.
We have a few national chains that expanded hugely, probably far beyond their ability to service, as part of a huge turf war a few years ago. Now they're stuck with loads of locations to fill, and mediocre to terrible service in their core-competency. My family members are constantly fighting with the local chain pharmacy just to achieve things like "be able to collect a prescription during the posted hours" because their staffing has been so terrible.
All the while, they're bleeding customers in that space: you've got health plans desperately pushing mail-order, some plans that refuse to treat some pharmacies as preferred (I had to go to a different chain when I actually wanted to use my plan), and customers being more prone to comparison shopping that tells me that my prescription is cheaper to pay cash for at the local supermarket I'm already visiting, than to pay my co-pay-- or let alone the absurd cash price-- Walgreens or CVS wants for it.
But let's not talk about that. Let's focus on the mediocre convenience store bolted onto the side of the drug counter. The one which is nobody's first stop for any given product. We found a way to make it more miserable and now people will buy 4% more of those weird house-brand snack foods!
> The one which is nobody's first stop for any given product.
Walgreens unfortunately is mine for many things, due to being the most walkable location for staples in my neighborhood, but they put zero focus into it here. The last few years have just been a steady stream of stopping into Walgreen for something only to realize that they ran out and never intend to restock.
They make lots of investments that don't turn out. But they never make investments that aren't supported by a logical business model that makes sense for them. In this case, I am certain that tests show people will open doors less (saving energy costs), buy more and more often (ads) and other benefits that outweigh the gallery shouting "this is stupid."
Is it full proof? Of course not. Models are inaccurate all the time. But this article and the comments here acting like this is so obviously a terrible idea are silly.
I worked on a digital signage product back in the early 2010s that used OpenCV to track consumers using facial data. Those front facing sensors are cameras.
If only you could make the door out of a cheap, hard-surface material, made from abundant raw materials, one that is also transparent, allowing you to see what is inside in real time, with pretty much zero power usage.
Far more energy and natural resources are going to be used to make those big screens than melting some sand for glass. Double wall glass doors with a good vacuum are incredibly effective insulators too. I doubt infrared radiation that goes through the glass is a big concern in the real world--unless your 7/11 is on Mercury.
Glass is very energy-expensive to manufacture. It softens around 1000 degrees centigrade and melts around 1500 degrees centigrade, which makes it incredibly expensive to recycle into a product with a different geometry. For glass bottles at least, "recycling" consists of washing the bottle and shipping it back to the bottler. (Here in Korea, people use the empty bottles as ash trays, and occasionally a bottle with ash still in it is delivered to a consumer, making the news.)
I'm skeptical of that claim. The screen has to be really bright since stores are brightly lit themselves. Then you're putting something generating heat right up against the cavity you want to keep cold.
And then there's the accounts of people opening the doors to see what's inside because it's faster, or opening the doors only to find out the product they wanted is actually not there.
It would be shocking and the first time ever if the sales pitch of a product was completely made up and false. And the product turned out to be worse than the current solution in place. /s
I would be very skeptical because the display surface of the door always seems to be kind of toasty warm.
These doors are brightly lit; they are a lot of pixels; each door has the equivalent of a computer and a couple graphics cards in them. I believe that the doors even have active cooling fan vents on the sides (the doors are something like 3 inches thick!).
I've never even seen double paned glass doors. That seems like the obvious first step if you care about insulation. (Hmm, never say never, I guess I probably have, I'll have to check walgreens next time I stop in to see how insulated the old doors are.)
I saw this company (Cooler Screens) pop up on a job board and I really really did not get it. What problem is being solved by replacing a clear panel with a tv screen only to have to track inventory using shoddy computer vision? Are they trying to save energy by preventing excess opens/closes? Customers already do not trust the “In Stock” status on stores’ websites, if they see an item out of stock on the screen, they will open it to see for themselves and there will be instances where the customer was right to look, further reinforcing this behavior.
This entire product seems like a thinly veiled effort to push more unwanted and intrusive ads. The technologist in me wants to believe there is more to this so I would be happy to be proven wrong, if anyone else has some insight.
> What problem is being solved by replacing a clear panel with a tv screen only to have to track inventory using shoddy computer vision?
Ads. They can make you look at an add at eye level on something you need to look at ( because you want to know if there's pizza or whatever there). It's a potentially pretty valuable ad for "super discount on X" or even regular crap.
Once most of the retailers have installed the product obscuring screens, another startup can produce an Augmented Reality 'x-ray' app that lets you see what's behind the screen by using your smartphone/smart glasses/whatever. They'll make money by selling ads, of course. Another ad-tech company will help a competing retailer place an ad in the AR app telling you about their store down the street that has installed these miraculous glass doors that let you just see their products. The store you're in will pay an analytics company big bucks to determine (in part, from a data feed from the AR app) their customer abandonment rate due to the screens. This data, combined with their competitor down the street taking customers, will allow a consultant to make bank recommending the original retailer install transparent doors. Ah, the virtuous cycle of tech.
The "problem" being solved is that the manufacturers of the products sold at Walgreens (presumably) profit from their sale, which means there is room for Walgreens (and an accomplice) to shake them down for a fee and still leave everyone willing to continue the relationship.
This is already done through methods like selling prime shelf space (e.g. eye level) but this only works to a certain extent. Cooler Screens and Walgreens are pioneering a new system where video screens and advertisements are used to further manipulate shoppers towards certain products. Manufacturers who play the game are able to maintain their existing level of sales or even slightly grow them, minus the additional rent they are paying Walgreens and Cooler Screens, at the expense of manufacturers who don't play the game.
This could backfire if the video screens both increase store costs (for the reasons you described) and reduce store revenues from upset customers who no longer wish to shop in such a hostile environment. On the other hand, Walgreens is apparently betting that they have capacity to harass their customers without losing too many of them.
I view advertisements as the second hand smoke of the modern age. In theory ads are only placed by the consent of the space owner, but in practice they serve to pollute our environments in psychologically harmful ways, in the same way second hand smoke pollutes our physical environment.
I wonder when the dystopia of Pohl's comes true. The Space Merchants has some interesting things about marketing. Like beaming adds to screens of vehicles and in future straight to retinas...
At least with smoking, the person who lit the cigarette intends to consume it. Here, even in the theoretical case, the ad serves no purpose to the space owner except to the extent that other people watch it.
I'd guess it's either a flat-out lie, or they described a hypothetical perfect version of the system and counted someone as positive if they thought there was even one slightly good thing about it.
I don’t get why they would use opaque screens. There are transparent glass screens now, Disney uses them all the time. You could see inside and still display graphics on the glass. Fuck man…
"The items on display don't always match up with what's inside because products are out of stock."
That's been my experience. If not out of stock, perhaps shelved elsewhere.
Putting signage of any kind on fridge doors in retail is annoying. Just let us see the products. Aisle clutter in supermarkets has become worse, too. In some places it's so bad that it's not worth shopping in person any more.
I saw these for the first time at a Walgreens in Florida recently -- I hate these things -- I want to see what's inside! (and I'm not interested in having to watch an ad before it'll tell me where the milk is). I feel like it's out of some sort of dystopian Robocob/Snowcrash-esque story.
The Walgreens down the street from me did this. For a month after they installed them, the whole wall of fridges was offline (warm inside and no product loaded), during which time I found other stores and stopped checking. Then when they were finally working, the user experience was pretty bad. In theory, what's supposed to happen is that when you're far away it shows you a giant-font indicator of what's inside, or an ad, and then when you get close, a motion sensor detects that you're there and replaces the display with a map of the contents, that's kind of like looking through glass.
The problem is that the motion sensor coverage area is too small, and the transition to map view is too slow, so you wind up standing in front of an opaque screen that's supposed to be showing you what's inside, but isn't. Then it's faster to open the door than it is to wait for it to change, so you wind up opening the door, searching for the product you wanted with the door open, and wasting a bunch of energy.
It could be that the fridges behind the screens are better insulated than transparent ones. But having to open them to see what's inside certainly makes it cost more.
It's quite likely that the screen generates a lot of heat that it's pushing back into the cooler. It's probably more than would have been absorbed from ambient.
So now you're paying twice for energy: once for the display, and again in increased refrigeration costs.
My experience is the same. It does eventually show you what’s inside, but it’s not faster than just opening the door. I think something like AR would make a better experience.
It turns out that making a digital display work as well as human vision is a monumental technical challenge. For instance the makers of microscopes have only begun making research quality microscopes where you actually want to use the digital display instead of the eyepieces, for "difficult" specimens.
That and eye tracking to data mine shoppers' gazes for the benefit of marketing departments (and Cooler Screens) to optimize displays. Truly an "exciting" customer experience.
At least yours appears to be trying to do something. The Walgreens that have them around here just have the screen on a static display of drinks (about half of which are actually there when you open it.)
I wondered why people hated them so much as the description in the article seemed decent. It even seemed like it could work ok if the screen layout were efficient.
Thanks for clarifying that its not just a solution in search of a problem but a really horribly implemented solution.
> The company wants to engage more people with advertising [...]
> Retailers are eager to add new experiences to their physical stores. But many consumers aren't eager to change their habits — and they certainly aren't used to watching freezer-display ads.
> "People really appreciate their routines. They're not always seeking excitement," said Julio Sevilla
Has CNN introduced a parody section when I wasn't looking? Is this some sort of joke article, satirising corporate nonsense-speak and journalists blindly reprinting press releases?
This isn't a matter of shoppers being scared of "change" or disliking "excitement" - nobody is "excited" to "engage with advertising", they're just inconvenienced. This is walgreens making the shopping experience worse in the hopes of making more money.
How someone so unable to speak plainly could forge a career as a professional journalist I have no idea....
Depends on how you define "experience". Do I want attentive cashiers that are efficient and friendly? How about clear standardized pricing to price compare? Conveniently placed workers that can direct me to the right location? Predictable product placements?
Whether you like it or not, grocery store is an experience. For instance there are considerably cheaper grocers that can fulfill many basic goods (C-Town, Dollar General, etc) but some people avoid because the "experience" is not as pleasant (lighting, color scheme, spacing, etc)
It's not "advertisers". It's the actual product brands.
I agree the freezer thing sounds awful and hopefully is just a failed experiment. But products and layout are optimized by the brand. Just take a look at the packaging. Pretty standard comparable size, dimensions that fit in the place they're meant to be stored, meaningful information up front, clear well printed packaging, a million other things. I don't think you're giving enough credit to how incredibly convenient and curated a trip to a modern grocery store in an economically developed country is.
The goal is to sell you more stuff obviously but 95% of the time my interests are aligned with the brand. I don't want to waste time figuring stuff out. They just make it easy for me.
Advertisers work for brands, they're humans who make ads to sell us shit we didn't ask for. Personally I don't care which brand they work for, I want them all to stop. Whether its a blatant ad for a product or a product itself being turned into an ad, its all obnoxious and wasteful
Yeah, and its worse than that. Since the brands are managed by brokers who setup sales, the facing/amount displayed on the shelf, the location on the shelf and the store, and so on.
Ya know, I might approve of putting ads on toilet paper. Then I can wipe my ass on their brand and flush it down the drain like it deserves. It'd be cathartic.
Yes, and imagine having the “experience” of 15 minutes of commercials with your poop session! It’s a goldmine for advertisers!
/s
I hate advertising and actively disrespect people who work in the ad industry. It’s virtually all just disinformation and behavioral modification tricks. The cigarettes for our brains in the 21st century.
Toilets have been tried. Generally you can't pee high enough to desecrate the eye-level advertisements at a urinal. Toilet advertisements are much more easily desecrated.
The store is small enough that even if you don't know the layout it doesn't take long to find something. There are only a few choices (if that many) for any given item so you generally don't even think about price-comparing on a per-ounce basis or anything like that. The cashiers are blazing fast. You are in, out, and get on with your day. No they don't stock everything but they have all the staple products you need from day-to-day.
I'm not going to stand in front of 6 selections of deli meat and use my calculator and take notes on their price conversions to determine which one to get. I'm going to accept I'll probably slightly overpay and move on with my life.
Online shopping during the pandemic has been pretty great for me. The biggest problem in Australia is that it's very clear the supermarket chains don't process seriously enough - i.e. random substitutions without notification are way to common.
But I miss absolutely nothing about going to a grocery store.
EDIT: in fact in general the pandemic has been pretty good at cutting the number of ads I have to see and hear daily since I've been away from high trafficked areas a lot. That sensory assault I do not miss at all.
Exactly. What consumer has a desire for a “retail media company?” Gross. Especially one that’s business model is to interrupt the retail experience to inject non-value added advertising?
A consumer of Walgreen's stock, which needs something new, anything, to juice attention and move the price, since it's taboo to be a public company that just cruises along. The de facto primacy of stock performance in executive qualifications means you have a lot more fridge-screens to look forward to if the initial antipathy toward these fades into begruding acceptance the way they are predicting.
Well, there's some merit to measuring one's shopping in terms of "experience".
Well-laid out spacious store, with good lighting and non-obtrusive background music is quantifiably better than a dirty, cramped corner store with a sus-looking shopkeeper and ethnic music blaring out of tin speakers.
But, clearly, being exposed to #more# ads is not something that adds to said experience positively.
Some people can't tell an oud from a hole in the head. "Good" (in flaming hot Cheeto air quotes) grocery stores pick music to create a safe space where they won't be challenged by other music traditions. Or worse, the places where those traditions blend with Western music. Can't let little Timmy hear a 7th or he might turn out bad.
I would love to go to unkept, dirty and disorganized bazaar in Iran. Stores with owners that specialize in a couple of things. A granary for lentils. A butcher shop. A spice house. Complete contrast with Louis Vuitton store you’re describing.
“Ethnic music blaring out of tin speakers” sounds racist because it is. Please don’t do be like that. Bad speakers are annoying but it’s annoying regardless of what musics so making it racial is not cool. Parking lot music is awful and it’s generic stuff
Precious few “journalists” are journalists in any meaningful sense (I suppose we could say something similar of software “engineers,” but this is a dead horse here)
Call it fake news, propaganda, or the nice PR - but that’s what these “journalists” are. They’re not true journalists but serial killers, wearing the skin of the dying profession.
> “ How someone so unable to speak plainly could forge a career as a professional journalist I have no idea....”
Most journalists are in the ad business - imo this is why they hate Facebook so much, they’re competitors and ad supported news orgs mostly ship a crappier product.
I know this will come off a bit spicy, but this is how all of CNN's articles are written, it's just that we're way more sensitive to wording that's sympathetic to advertising. This is how the media shapes language and ultimately shapes people to tolerate the way police treat black people, how the homeless are treated, and so on and so forth.
This comment reminds me of a brilliant commercial from many years ago, where Trident parodied the X out of Y approve meme: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=xAVALXH9nxU
Walgreens reportedly put millions into Theranos. Seems like at some level there must be a lot of pressure to be "innovative" and a lack of understanding how to do it.
Or fudged up the methodology... show them a fridge with a display, ask them "does this look exciting to you?" (without context), they say "yes", "ok thank you, bye, ... next!"
I agree these are a travesty no consumer wants, except I notice they do have a braille plaque and a button with a little grill. I presume they will speak their contents to you if you are vision impaired.
Traditional accessibility features have always been optional. Very important if you need them, but out of the way if you don't. This obviously isn't optional. The trend these days is to hide bad motives behind good uses - like 'lock down all hardware to protect the users' or 'ban all encryption because pedophiles use it'. I'm not implying that that's what you're doing, but this is exactly the argument they are going to come up with.
Another point worth mentioning is that the startup claims that their 'targeted ad' tech is 'identity blind'. (I have visceral hatred towards targeted ads). What is preventing them from making it identity-aware in the future if it succeeds by any chance - especially given the fact that targeted ads work better when it is identity-aware? It will eventually become the real-world equivalent of online cross-site tracking, no matter what the creator claim. Never concede ground to malicious technology just because it has some purported benign uses. Let them just add a braille pad and speaker on the side for users who need it.
You are aware that the "excitement" came from a quote from a professor. That wasn't the reporters language? That the reporter included other quotes from people who expressed both annoyance at the presence of the ads and how difficult it was to use.
this is what i ask about why do we need "Advertising". people do not "WANT" to see adverts, even if it is what has built technologies and paid for advancements.
i would rather stare at a blank wall with a drab white color than watch the newest variety of pizza topping by pizza hut or gilette shaving blade ad.
sure they pay to subsidize tech but i would rather pay to have them not be seen than being forced to watch.
the same is with internet. go and open any website without having ublock origin and you will be surprised or more like outraged because the ad cancer is really really bad.
If people really don't like them, I'm surprised a little mild civil disobediance campaign hasn't broken out, such as wedging the door open after getting something out. They'd soon get the message.
They have cameras on all of them. They could identify you can ban you. But I still agree, they should let in the san francisco shop lifters to smash these unholy screens.
Cooler Screens CEO is either delusional or manipulative. Or has access to some unusually accurate consumer research that somehow contradicts the apparently incorrect broadly accepted truth.
No. Just no. Things like this makes the shopping experience much more unpleasant. I'll certainly avoid stores that use this sort of thing while that's possible.
Recall that Walgreens has a history of making moronic decisions, like contracting with Theranos in spite of receiving clear-cut warnings against doing so.
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[ 3.5 ms ] story [ 253 ms ] threadSo the transparent doors are now giant screens that show video ads all over them until you're in front of it.
When you're in front of it, it shows all the stuff it may have inside.
The "may" is where the really stupid part of this tech comes into play -- the screen shows what is available on a fully stocked shelf but when you open it to look inside, you can see there may be entire rows/products that aren't in stock (as seen in some customer videos in the article).
I know some people like the “low distraction” of something like CNN’s lite mode but I hate it. Since there are no pictures I can’t see what they’re talking about, and that’s often important for the story (like here).
An ad blocker serves me just fine. Or I could turn on reader mode in my browser. Either way I still get the pictures. And they’re important to me.
I really hate the trend of putting "smart" screens and networked ads everywhere. Those startup bros can go jump off a cliff with their trash ideas.
Is it really so hard for retailers to stick to their core competencies and keep the transaction simple between us? I give them money, they give me goods/services. No need to get random middlemen involved.
If I see these color door screens someplace, I am simple going to walk out and refuse to give that store any business. I refuse to support companies that are actively trying to make my life harder.
You literally said you open them hard to break them.
Instead, talk to the manager and explain why you dislike the removal of glass doors and why you will no longer do business at their store as a result.
Digital shelves are still stupid as all hell, but strictly from a KISS perspective, not a business one. The fact that this approach is so conceptually similar to existing SOP is probably why so many big grocers are getting swindled by this "innovation".
It is much worse than that. Even companies willing to stay on top have trouble, can be affected by zero days, data leaks, and eventually stop supporting their hardware.
A solution looking for a problem for sure. Maybe next they'll try one of those fancy transparent OLED panels and run ads on it!
For example, Walgreens partnership / investment in Theranos was spectacularly costly [0].
[0] https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2021/10/13/therano...
We have a few national chains that expanded hugely, probably far beyond their ability to service, as part of a huge turf war a few years ago. Now they're stuck with loads of locations to fill, and mediocre to terrible service in their core-competency. My family members are constantly fighting with the local chain pharmacy just to achieve things like "be able to collect a prescription during the posted hours" because their staffing has been so terrible.
All the while, they're bleeding customers in that space: you've got health plans desperately pushing mail-order, some plans that refuse to treat some pharmacies as preferred (I had to go to a different chain when I actually wanted to use my plan), and customers being more prone to comparison shopping that tells me that my prescription is cheaper to pay cash for at the local supermarket I'm already visiting, than to pay my co-pay-- or let alone the absurd cash price-- Walgreens or CVS wants for it.
But let's not talk about that. Let's focus on the mediocre convenience store bolted onto the side of the drug counter. The one which is nobody's first stop for any given product. We found a way to make it more miserable and now people will buy 4% more of those weird house-brand snack foods!
Walgreens unfortunately is mine for many things, due to being the most walkable location for staples in my neighborhood, but they put zero focus into it here. The last few years have just been a steady stream of stopping into Walgreen for something only to realize that they ran out and never intend to restock.
Is it full proof? Of course not. Models are inaccurate all the time. But this article and the comments here acting like this is so obviously a terrible idea are silly.
Another example of why the word "modernize" has gained a very negative connotation for me.
The freezers have front-facing sensors used to anonymously track shoppers interacting with the platform
That is truly disturbing.
No doubt they're going to say these screens save cooling costs as part of promoting the green-globalist agenda...
And just funny question, does the light go off inside those when door is closed?
AFAIK one of the claims is that the doors are a net energy savings, because you can use better, opaque insulation material rather than glass.
And then there's the accounts of people opening the doors to see what's inside because it's faster, or opening the doors only to find out the product they wanted is actually not there.
It just feels highly unlikely.
These doors are brightly lit; they are a lot of pixels; each door has the equivalent of a computer and a couple graphics cards in them. I believe that the doors even have active cooling fan vents on the sides (the doors are something like 3 inches thick!).
None of this says "power savings" to me.
This entire product seems like a thinly veiled effort to push more unwanted and intrusive ads. The technologist in me wants to believe there is more to this so I would be happy to be proven wrong, if anyone else has some insight.
Ads. They can make you look at an add at eye level on something you need to look at ( because you want to know if there's pizza or whatever there). It's a potentially pretty valuable ad for "super discount on X" or even regular crap.
I'll just open the door.
Once most of the retailers have installed the product obscuring screens, another startup can produce an Augmented Reality 'x-ray' app that lets you see what's behind the screen by using your smartphone/smart glasses/whatever. They'll make money by selling ads, of course. Another ad-tech company will help a competing retailer place an ad in the AR app telling you about their store down the street that has installed these miraculous glass doors that let you just see their products. The store you're in will pay an analytics company big bucks to determine (in part, from a data feed from the AR app) their customer abandonment rate due to the screens. This data, combined with their competitor down the street taking customers, will allow a consultant to make bank recommending the original retailer install transparent doors. Ah, the virtuous cycle of tech.
This is already done through methods like selling prime shelf space (e.g. eye level) but this only works to a certain extent. Cooler Screens and Walgreens are pioneering a new system where video screens and advertisements are used to further manipulate shoppers towards certain products. Manufacturers who play the game are able to maintain their existing level of sales or even slightly grow them, minus the additional rent they are paying Walgreens and Cooler Screens, at the expense of manufacturers who don't play the game.
This could backfire if the video screens both increase store costs (for the reasons you described) and reduce store revenues from upset customers who no longer wish to shop in such a hostile environment. On the other hand, Walgreens is apparently betting that they have capacity to harass their customers without losing too many of them.
That was funny.
Or maybe they just made it up. Startup founders have done worse right?
Just have to ask bunch of questions leading to answer and then just publish that one...
Starts at about 1:00. One of my favorite shows
Edit: updated link, thanks @dvngnt_
here's the exact link with a time stamp
To waking up in a bathtub of ice missing a kidney, maybe.
That's been my experience. If not out of stock, perhaps shelved elsewhere.
Putting signage of any kind on fridge doors in retail is annoying. Just let us see the products. Aisle clutter in supermarkets has become worse, too. In some places it's so bad that it's not worth shopping in person any more.
The problem is that the motion sensor coverage area is too small, and the transition to map view is too slow, so you wind up standing in front of an opaque screen that's supposed to be showing you what's inside, but isn't. Then it's faster to open the door than it is to wait for it to change, so you wind up opening the door, searching for the product you wanted with the door open, and wasting a bunch of energy.
So now you're paying twice for energy: once for the display, and again in increased refrigeration costs.
https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2019/01/walgr...
Thanks for clarifying that its not just a solution in search of a problem but a really horribly implemented solution.
Now I get it.
> Retailers are eager to add new experiences to their physical stores. But many consumers aren't eager to change their habits — and they certainly aren't used to watching freezer-display ads.
> "People really appreciate their routines. They're not always seeking excitement," said Julio Sevilla
Has CNN introduced a parody section when I wasn't looking? Is this some sort of joke article, satirising corporate nonsense-speak and journalists blindly reprinting press releases?
This isn't a matter of shoppers being scared of "change" or disliking "excitement" - nobody is "excited" to "engage with advertising", they're just inconvenienced. This is walgreens making the shopping experience worse in the hopes of making more money.
How someone so unable to speak plainly could forge a career as a professional journalist I have no idea....
Whether you like it or not, grocery store is an experience. For instance there are considerably cheaper grocers that can fulfill many basic goods (C-Town, Dollar General, etc) but some people avoid because the "experience" is not as pleasant (lighting, color scheme, spacing, etc)
I don't think the optimization is the issue, it's who's doing the optimization and why/what purpose
I agree the freezer thing sounds awful and hopefully is just a failed experiment. But products and layout are optimized by the brand. Just take a look at the packaging. Pretty standard comparable size, dimensions that fit in the place they're meant to be stored, meaningful information up front, clear well printed packaging, a million other things. I don't think you're giving enough credit to how incredibly convenient and curated a trip to a modern grocery store in an economically developed country is.
The goal is to sell you more stuff obviously but 95% of the time my interests are aligned with the brand. I don't want to waste time figuring stuff out. They just make it easy for me.
/s
I hate advertising and actively disrespect people who work in the ad industry. It’s virtually all just disinformation and behavioral modification tricks. The cigarettes for our brains in the 21st century.
The store is small enough that even if you don't know the layout it doesn't take long to find something. There are only a few choices (if that many) for any given item so you generally don't even think about price-comparing on a per-ounce basis or anything like that. The cashiers are blazing fast. You are in, out, and get on with your day. No they don't stock everything but they have all the staple products you need from day-to-day.
The harder it is to run in autopilot, the more inane distractions there are, the worse the activity.
But I miss absolutely nothing about going to a grocery store.
EDIT: in fact in general the pandemic has been pretty good at cutting the number of ads I have to see and hear daily since I've been away from high trafficked areas a lot. That sensory assault I do not miss at all.
Well-laid out spacious store, with good lighting and non-obtrusive background music is quantifiably better than a dirty, cramped corner store with a sus-looking shopkeeper and ethnic music blaring out of tin speakers.
But, clearly, being exposed to #more# ads is not something that adds to said experience positively.
Well, I was in an Indian store recently and they were playing this story from the radio, I'll admit it wasn't a pleasant experience.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-60676276
Now, that’s an experience.
Call it fake news, propaganda, or the nice PR - but that’s what these “journalists” are. They’re not true journalists but serial killers, wearing the skin of the dying profession.
The ridiculousness of the story sells itself. It doesn't really need professional help.
Most journalists are in the ad business - imo this is why they hate Facebook so much, they’re competitors and ad supported news orgs mostly ship a crappier product.
Minimum word limits throughout college, for starters.
So apparently they're wildly unable to gather a representative sample of people, or have structured their survey to mislead them to an extreme degree.
Sounds like a company to stay far away from.
Nothing screams failure like appearing on media lying about how everyone likes you so much.
they speak with the exact degree of obfuscation as is required to get their paycheque.
That might be nice. So, one redeeming feature.
Another point worth mentioning is that the startup claims that their 'targeted ad' tech is 'identity blind'. (I have visceral hatred towards targeted ads). What is preventing them from making it identity-aware in the future if it succeeds by any chance - especially given the fact that targeted ads work better when it is identity-aware? It will eventually become the real-world equivalent of online cross-site tracking, no matter what the creator claim. Never concede ground to malicious technology just because it has some purported benign uses. Let them just add a braille pad and speaker on the side for users who need it.
i would rather stare at a blank wall with a drab white color than watch the newest variety of pizza topping by pizza hut or gilette shaving blade ad.
sure they pay to subsidize tech but i would rather pay to have them not be seen than being forced to watch.
the same is with internet. go and open any website without having ublock origin and you will be surprised or more like outraged because the ad cancer is really really bad.
1 https://twitter.com/internetofshit
https://www.reddit.com/r/theinternetofshit/