Smart Cart

Continuing with the trend towards retailers going green a concept of a smart cart with an installed computer is being explored reports the Wall Street Journal in this article (subscription maybe required). A study by EDS as per the article indicates that this cart can be used by customers to scan the barcode to get most of the nutritional information which would otherwise be crammed into excessive packaging on the items and thereby taking up more resources. The other side to it is that it will help a health and environmentally conscious customer be better informed on the contents of the item from a calorie, ethical treatment perspective. So in a way its another extension of service to an increasing creed of customers who are more health and environment conscious. But does this end here? So what do retailers have to leverage out of this? The details of the on board computer arent revealed to examine its capabilities but some of the things that come to my mind are

1. Item correlations: If there is a way to store the information on what items were scanned by the customer in a specific aisle, it gives some good data to plan assorments in a specific department
2. Travel time: The computer data can possibly be used to identify how much the customer travels on an average between picking up items. Can the aisle/shelf positioning be improved so that the customer can get to what he needs faster saving her some time?
3. Promotions: On scanning an item, can the computer display any special promotions that are going on for that item
4. Private Label: For every branded item scanned by the customer, can the system reveal the price and location of an equivalent private label item.
5. Recipes: Can the computer suggest some quick meal recipes in which the scanned item can be used. If the customer finds it interesting, maybe it can lead her to buy the other ingredients to complete the purchase and also print the recipe.

Maybe I am reading too much into the smart cart computer. I will watch out for more details on it and follow up with the post.