Tech: Cashierless

  1. Retail Operations

Scotmid Co-op completes rollout of assisted checkout solution from 4POS

Scotmid Co-op has enhanced customer experience (CX), streamlined store operations and future-proofed its estate with a modular, hybrid self-checkout solution from Point of Sale company 4POS. Recognising shopper demand for fast, convenient and flexible checkout experiences, Scotmid, Scotland’s largest independent co-operative, sought to reduce checkout… This story continues at Scotmid Co-op completes rollout of assisted […]
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  1. Technology & Innovation

AI becomes central to M&S technology transformation: these are the biggest retail stories from March

March is done and dusted, April is up and running, so let’s kick back and reflect on another eventful month for the retail technology space. Here’s your briefing on the most important stories from March, including VenHub Global, RTS 2026, Zalando, Nomagic, Co-op, VoCoVo, StrongPoint, Iceland Foods, AiFi, Boxbar Tech, Groupe Dynamite, and Manhattan Associates. […]
7 min read
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  1. Technology & Innovation

Convenience retailer Scotmid Co-op announces investment in 4POS assisted checkout solution

Scotmid Co-op is rolling out assisted/hybrid checkout solutions as the convenience retailer looks to improve loss prevention and reduce theft (walk-offs). The £3.5 million investment in its store tech and checkout solutions from 4POS has also reduced checkout friction for customers, with dual screens allowing colleagues to step in and offer assistance to reduce shopper […]
3 min read
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  1. Technology & Innovation

Checkout free stores demonstrate good technology but bad value equation as Amazon and Aldi exit UK

In September of last year, we reported that Amazon was binning its ambitious Amazon Fresh experiment in the UK, just four years after the US online giant launched its first grocery store in London. It has shuttered its 19 Fresh stores, with plans to convert five of these into Whole Foods Market locations. The first […]
3 min read
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  1. Technology & Innovation

Inaugural ETIH EdTech Innovation Awards invites submissions for campus retail technology category

There are now just three days left to enter our sister title ETIH’s inaugural Innovation Awards 2026, with submissions continuing to come in at pace from across the global EdTech sector. As a new programme, this year marks the first opportunity for organisations to be part of what is set to become a key moment […]
2 min read
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  1. Technology & Innovation

Many Brits would stump up more for a seamless shopping experience, Visualsoft research

New research from Visualsoft, surveying 2,000 UK consumers, shows that 33% would pay a premium for a seamless shopping journey. Among younger consumers aged 18–34, that figure rises to more than 60%. Frictionless shopping is key for younger demographics, and that includes everything from knowing what’s in-store before setting out, simple payments, earning loyalty points […]
4 min read
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  1. Stores & Formats

Moves To Drive Food Industry Back To The Past Gain New Momentum

The New York State Attorney General has come out in favor of a bill that would ban electronic shelf labels, calling them an “exploitive practice” resulting in higher prices. From The Gothamist: “New York Attorney General Letitia James is throwing her support behind state legislation to curtail retailers and grocers from setting prices using algorithms […]
3 min read
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  1. Technology & Innovation

Aldi UK ditches Greenwich, South East London Shop & Go checkout-free store experiment

Aldi UK is binning its checkout-free stores trial and converting its only Shop & Go location to a standard Aldi Local with self-service. The store in Greenwich, South East London went live in 2022 at a time when checkout-free stores were being touted by many industry observers as the next big thing in retail. But […]
3 min read
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  1. Technology & Innovation

Autonomous market goes live at Co-op Live arena powered by AiFi and Boxbar Tech solutions

Co-op Live, an indoor arena in Manchester, England, sited in the Etihad Campus next to the City of Manchester Stadium, has launched an autonomous market powered by AiFi’s spatial intelligence platform and Boxbar Tech’s self-serve beverage technology. Built in partnership with Oak View Group (OVG), this has been engineered to maximise speed, throughput and convenience […]
3 min read
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  1. Technology & Innovation

Self-checkout technology milestone for Lidl Ireland as food retailer’s 100th store goes live

Lidl Ireland is celebrating a self-checkout technology milestone. In a LinkedIn post, it said: “We are thrilled to announce a major milestone in our mission to provide the best shopping experience in Ireland: our 100th store (Lidl Fonthill) has officially gone live with self-checkout (SCO) technology.” It added: “We’re investing €10.7 million to modernise how […]
2 min read
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  1. Data & Insights

Meet Every Shopper Where they are: The Retail Imperative for Multimodal, Accessible Self-Service

The New Reality of Retail Self-Service Self-service is no longer confined to a few large touchscreens near the front of a store. Today, it shows up everywhere, often in places shoppers do not consciously label as kiosks at all. It might be a self-checkout lane at a grocery store. A tablet used to order food […]
4 min read
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  1. Department & Category

From Corner Grocery to National Chain: A Historical Overview of Convenience Retail

The modern convenience store (C-store) traces its roots to the early 20th century’s neighborhood corner shops and service stations — simple places where travelers and local residents could buy milk or a snack without entering a full grocery. Over the decades, these mom-and-pop operations dotted towns and cities, creating community hubs with an intensely local […]
5 min read
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  1. Data & Insights

Tipping at the Drive Thru Good Idea or Bad Idea

  By any metric, Toast is on a heater. The Boston tech player that already powers roughly one in five independent restaurants has been stacking logos, scaling payments, and moving upstream into enterprise. Landing deals with Applebee’s, Firehouse Subs, and Papa Murphy’s signaled it can play far beyond mom-and-pop. Now comes the next frontier: the […]
4 min read
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  1. Channel: Ecommerce & Digital

Amazon Fresh and Amazon Go Are Gone A Historical Retrospective on Amazon’s Grocery Experiments & the Road Ahead

  On January 27, 2026, Amazon confirmed what many analysts had quietly anticipated: its Amazon Fresh and Amazon Go store banners are being shuttered across the U.S., ending a decade of experimentation in brick-and-mortar grocery retail. According to Amazon, all 57 Amazon Fresh grocery stores and 15 Amazon Go locations are slated to close imminently […]
5 min read
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  1. Channel: Ecommerce & Digital

Amazon One – And, Apparently, Done

Amazon has notified customers who use its Amazon One palm payment authentication service that as of June 3, 2026, it no longer will be available at retail businesses – including Whole Foods, where it was part of the chain’s self-checkout systems. Here is the email that went out to users: The company promises to delete […]
2 min read
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  1. Channel: Ecommerce & Digital

BREAKING NEWS:  Amazon Bails Out Of Physical Stores Business, Closing Go And Fresh Stores

Amazon announced today that it is closing its 57 Amazon Fresh Stores and 15 Amazon Go stores.  With the exception of Whole Foods, which it acquired for $13.7 billion in 2017, it will now be out of the bricks-and-mortar business for the time being. The company’s food retail focus now will be on expanding its […]
3 min read
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  1. Channel: Ecommerce & Digital

Amazon Pulls the Plug on Fresh and Go Stores, Plans 100+ New Whole Foods

Amazon will close all remaining Amazon Go and Amazon Fresh stores to focus on its growing online grocery offering and the Whole Foods Market banner. Some of the locations set to be closed will be converted to Whole Foods, and the company also said it plans to open more than 100 new Whole Foods stores over […]
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  1. Data & Insights

Uniqlo to Debut Stores in Miami, Add to Texas Footprint

This fall, apparel retailer Uniqlo will open its first stores in Miami and deepen its presence in Texas, by entering the Austin market for the first time and adding a store at the Houston Galleria. The retailer has only been operating in Texas since 2024, so this expansion reflects the strong reception Uniqlo has received […]
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  1. Channel: Ecommerce & Digital

Amazon Chicago-Area Superstore Clears Local Planning Hurdle

Amazon wants to build a 229,000-square-foot “primarily retail” commercial building in Orland Park, Ill., just outside of Chicago proper, that would also include a “limited warehouse component supporting on-site operations,” according to an Orland Park statement. The proposed one-story building, located on a 35-acre commercially zoned property, would be larger than a Walmart Supercenter, which […]
2 min read
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  1. Data & Insights

Smart Carts, Smarter Standards: Why Amazon’s Dash Cart Is Long Overdue—and Why Younger Shoppers Will Make It the Norm

  For more than a decade, the grocery industry has talked about speed, convenience, and frictionless shopping. Consumers, meanwhile, have lived with slow checkout lines, understaffed front ends, and price anxiety that peaks precisely at the register according to Steven Johnson Grocerant Guru® at Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions®. Amazon’s expanded rollout of its updated […]
5 min read
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  1. Shopper & Customer

The End of the Penny: A Ripple Through Restaurants, C-Stores, and Grocery Stores

  When the United States officially retired from minting the penny in early 2025, few consumers initially adjusted their behavior; most saw it as a minor rounding change at checkout. But behind the scenes, restaurants, convenience stores, and grocery retailers faced complex operational and strategic shifts that revealed deeper truths about pricing psychology, cost control, […]
5 min read
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  1. Technology & Innovation

Milestone for Amazon Just Walk Out: last week’s biggest technology plays at a glance

RTIH rounds up the stand out retail technology deals, launches, deployments and pilots from the past seven days. Including AWS, Ocado Group, Currys, Stripe, Pennies, Tesco, Mistral AI, Asos, Sierra, Represent, Dema, Carrefour Belgium, and Reckon.ai. AWS A new Amazon Just Walk Out technology powered store has gone live at Loyola University New Orleans in […]
5 min read
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  1. Shopper & Customer

The Home Pantry Is Dying: Legacy Center-Store Food Sales Are Losing Relevance to Grocerant Fresh Food

  The idea that the home pantry remains the heart of American eating habits is no longer defensible according to Steven Johnson Grocerant Guru® at Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions®. Across the U.S., traditional center-store grocery categories — the very foundation of pantry staples — are losing dollar velocity and unit volume, even as consumers […]
5 min read
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  1. Technology & Innovation

Passing the AI driven CX baton: check out our most read retail technology articles from last week

Check out our most clicked retail technology articles from last week, including Tahina, Five9, Currys, Jellyfish, River Island, Akeneo, Fanatics, Rokt, PLUS, Pricer, and the RTIH AI in Retail Awards. QSR startup Tahina preps £2 million funding round for flagship London autonomous store Tahina, a London-based FoodTech startup which combines autonomous retail with fresh, healthy […]
6 min read
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  1. Channel: Grocery

Your Views:  Responses, Reactions, & Reflections

Responding to the controversy generated by accusations that Instacart was engaging in dynamic pricing, one MNB reader wrote: I read the Instacart response a couple of times and I am not sure what Instacart’s price policy is. They seemed to be throwing their customers, the supermarket companies, under the bus. When Instacart started they had […]
4 min read
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  1. Media & Marketing

FaceTime with the Content Guy:  Line Dancing

The Atlantic had a piece the other day about how “many grocery stores across the country regularly see longer lines for self-checkout than for cashiers,” an observation that suggests many Americans would prefer not to interact with checkout people.  I’d argue that this may say more about retailers than shoppers, and that these businesses may […]
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  1. Technology & Innovation

Level 2.5 autonomy: Amazon Just Walk Out tech isn’t dead. It’s just finally acting its age

In September, we reported that Amazon was binning its ambitious Just Walk Out technology powered Amazon Fresh experiment in the UK, just four years after the US online giant launched its first grocery store in London. It is set to shutter its 19 Fresh stores, with plans to convert five of these into Whole Foods […]
3 min read
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  1. Technology & Innovation

Primark launches proof of concept for cash and card payments self-checkouts at its York store

Primark has gone live with a proof of concept for self-checkouts that accept both cash and card payments at its store in York. The retailer started to roll-out self-checkouts across its stores in 2022. But while some shoppers welcomed the quicker and easier process, others were unhappy about the limited number of traditional tills and […]
2 min read
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  1. Trends & External Forces

Understanding prior authorisation: this is what it means for your healthcare

In today’s complex healthcare landscape, understanding insurance procedures is crucial for receiving the best possible care without unnecessary delays or complications. One of the key processes that can influence access to medical services is prior authorisation (PA). While it is an essential part of the insurance system, many patients and even healthcare providers struggle to […]
5 min read
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  1. Data & Insights

The Future of Autonomous Retail: Smart Stores Reshape the Intersection of Food and Convenience

  The future of retail is here, and it doesn’t have a cashier according to Steven Johnson Grocerant Guru® at Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions®. Autonomous retail stores, like VenHub’s new Smart Store at Los Angeles Union Station, are redefining convenience, efficiency, and the customer experience. What began as a futuristic idea born in the […]
4 min read
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Editor’s Choice

  1. Trends & External Forces
  2. Shopper & Customer
  3. Technology & Innovation
  4. Trends & External Forces
  5. Associates & Employees
  6. Merchandising
  7. Stores & Formats

Walmart to Expand Digital Shelf Labels Chainwide

Walmart will deploy digital shelf labels (DSLs) chainwide this year, doubling the approximately 2,300 U.S. locations currently using the technology (Walmart U.S. operates more than 4,600 stores). With more than 120,000 items in a typical Walmart store, managing price changes manually requires significant associate hours. Additionally, these DSLs are equipped with LED lights that make […]
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