Ahold Giant Foods to Roll out Robots

Note the planned use for operational process.  But also being in the store and interacting to some degree with customers?

NRF: Roving robots report for work at all Giant Foods’ stores  By Tom Ryan in Retailwire

At the NRF Big Show in New York on Monday, Nick Bertram, president at Giant Foods, revealed that the supermarket chain is rolling out “Marty,” a 6’3” robotic assistant, to all 172 of its stores.

Nearly 500 robots will be deployed out across Giant Foods and Stop & Shop, also owned by Ahold Delhaize, in what Steven Platt, research director, Retail Analytics Council, who also participated in the session, ranked as the largest robotics rollout at retail in the world.

Marty will be initially used to identify hazards, such as liquid, powder and bulk food item spills, and alert associates to do clean-ups. Planogram compliance and in-stock monitoring is expected next.

At the NRF session, Mr. Bertram said a surprise in the pilot of the robot was that customers weren’t intimated, but “actually loved” the robot. Including “googly eyes” added a “little bit more fun” to the robot’s appearance. He said, “[Marty] did freak some of them out, but especially children found that having a live robot in a supermarket is exciting.”  ....  '