Grocery chains join robot revolution
A wheeled robot called Marty is rolling into nearly 500 American grocery stores to alert employees if it encounters spilled granola, squashed tomatoes or a broken jar of mayonnaise – but there could be a human watching from behind its cartoonish googly eyes.
Badger Technologies CEO Tim Rowland says the camera-equipped robots stop after detecting a potential spill. But to make sure, humans working in a control centre in the Philippines review the imagery before triggering a cleanup message.
Rowland says 25 of the robots are now operating at Giant, Martin’s and Stop & Shop stores, with 30 more arriving each week. The chains are part of Dutch parent company Ahold Delhaize.
The robots move around using laser-based ‘‘lidar’’ sensors, and pause when shoppers and their carts veer into their path.
The googly eyes are fake, but each robot has eight cameras – some directed down at the floor, and others that can see shelves. Rowland said the robots could eventually be repurposed to help monitor a store’s inventory.
A robot at a Stop & Shop store in Seekonk, Massachusetts, yesterday alerted staff to a price tag that had fallen in one aisle, and a tiny sprig of herbs in another. It returned to the scene of each spill and waited until an employee pushed a button to acknowledge that the debris had been picked up.
It’s not the only robot that US shoppers might spot this year. Walmart and Midwestern supermarket chain Schnucks have deployed robots that help monitor inventory.
A union that represents Giant and Stop & Shop workers says it’s keeping an eye on Marty. It remains to be seen what the grocery chains will ultimately use the technology for.
UFCW president Marc Perrone said that the ‘‘aggressive expansion of automation in grocery and retail stores is a direct threat to the millions of American workers who power these industries and the customers they serve’’.