Circle K is welcoming the public to its first store with touchless, autonomous checkout.
At the store, which is located at 2196 E. Apache Blvd. in Tempe, customers will be able to buy items without ever going to the cash register. After signing up on the already existing Circle K app, people can just take what they want off the shelves and walk out the front door.
Circle K’s parent company, Canada-based Alimentation Couche-Tard Inc., is making a large investment into frictionless technology. The company created its first cashier-less store in Montreal on the campus of McGill University earlier this year and now it is working with Silicon Valley-based Standard AI to retrofit existing Circle K stores with this new technology.
"We are continually exploring ways to introduce technology that empowers our teams and shows our commitment to be a leader in retail innovation," Deborah Hall Lefevre, Couche-Tard's chief technology officer, said in a statement. "In Montreal, we built and opened our first frictionless location. In Arizona, we are going the next step by retrofitting existing stores with autonomous self-checkout systems to gain further insights into how frictionless technology can both make it easy and save time for our customers and allow our team members to focus on delivering a great experience.”
Standard’s technology uses a network of cameras mounted throughout the store and it is designed in a way to work around Circle K’s existing layout, fixtures, lighting, inventory management systems and visual merchandising plans.
In August 2020, Circle K and Standard announced a partnership to pilot its technology and for the past year Standard has been learning the ins and outs of a Circle K so it can figure out how to integrate the tech into the stores in a way that only enhances the shopping experiences, Standard’s co-founder and chief business officer Michael Suswal told the Business Journal.
“There were a lot of shopping experiences we had to learn,” he said. “Convenience stores, while small, are pretty diverse in their shopping behaviors. It is almost like a small supermarket.”
To make this idea work in real life, Standard’s team had to program the AI to understand everything people do and buy at a Circle K store whether it is hot dogs, fountain drinks, candy bars, beer, cigarettes or lottery tickets
“As good as it is at launch, it is going to evolve post-launch,” Suswal said. “It is going to get better over the next two to three quarters as we launch new features that require more data.”
Standard is not just launching this technology in one store, but is has signed a multistore agreement with Circle K and will be implanting it in stores in Phoenix and Tucson.
Different experience
The idea of a cashier-less store is not new. A few years ago, Amazon launched its Amazon Go brand of stores that uses similar technology to track customers and charge them for what they leave the store with. Standard’s goal is to be able to create that experience with existing retailers that already have stores and dedicated customer bases.
“The worst thing I can do to the world is to turn everyone into an Amazon Go,” Suswal said. “We really want retailers to be unique and be different and for us to provide the platform for us to bring the magic.”
The idea is that people are going to Circle K because it is Circle K, not because of the technology. Suswal said the tech is supposed to enhance the things people like about these retailers and get rid of annoyances, like waiting in line.
“We’ve integrated with their app, their loyalty programs, their backend systems,” Suswal said. “It is a full end-to-end suite integration of this technology.”
Obviously, this type of technology will cut back on the number of employees Circle K will need, but the company is already severely understaffed and struggles to hire enough employees as it is, and Suswal believes Standard’s systems will let employees get out from behind the cash register and interact with the customers on a more personal level.
“It seems counterintuitive that AI brings us closer together, but that’s our vision of what our technology can do,” Suswal said. “Let’s remove all the transactional-roboty stuff that we ask employees to do in stores today and get more to the point of engaging with and learning who their customers really are.”
Besides the staffing issues, Suswal said there are plenty of other ways Standard’s AI will help Circle K, including getting better analytics and store stats, improving the performance of the staff, pointing out and helping solve inefficiencies and helping with loss prevention.
Not right away
While the goal is to get to a completely autonomous situation, right now that isn’t a reality, Suswal said. When customers go into the Tempe Circle K with Standard’s technology, they will still have the option to purchase products at the cash register with cash or card.
“We always allow for transactions to occur that are not in our app,” Suswal said. “We never want to put a gate between a retailer and their revenue.”
Standard is going to gradually make the store more autonomous. In a few months, Suswal said, Standard will install a kiosk that takes peoples’ credit and debit cards but doesn’t require anything to be scanned. Then a few months after that, when there is enough confidence in the AI, Suswal said the kiosks will start taking cash.
While excited about these new moves and the increase in technology in the stores, Standard and Circle K have gone out of their way to make sure people know the cameras and the AI technology is only tracking movement and products in the store and not who people are or storing their personal information.
“Without privacy the company wouldn’t have started,” Suswal said. ”All the founders got together and said ‘I’m not doing this if we run the risk of stealing people’s data and giving it to the FBI.’”
It was more work, but to stick with its privacy goal, Suswal said Standard’s technology was developed so there would be no facial recognition in it.
Move to Arizona
Since Standard will be working on several Circle K stores in the Phoenix and Tucson area and will be continuing to test and improve its technology here, Suswal said it made sense to open an office in Arizona.
Standard is set to open a 6,000-square-foot office – or as the company calls it a lab – in the Valley on Oct. 15. The office is in Phoenix near Sky Harbor Airport.
“We’ve already started hiring,” Suswal said. “We are investing in Arizona because it is an upcoming tech area.”
The Circle K connection helped Standard land on Phoenix as a destination for its next office, but even before that, Suswal said they were looking at the Valley as a place where it can start developing and testing its new technology.
“Phoenix is becoming a tech city. Every major autonomous company has some kind of operation in Arizona,” he said.
Suswal is confident that Standard will be able to find talented employees here in Arizona. So far he said they have hired around four employees and are looking to grow the team to about 15 in the next six to eight months.
Insights, advice, suggestions, feedback and comments from experts
Introduction
As an expert in the field of retail innovation and technology, I can provide you with information about the concepts mentioned in this article. My expertise is based on extensive knowledge and experience in the retail industry, particularly in the area of frictionless technology and autonomous checkout systems.
Circle K's Frictionless Technology
Circle K, a convenience store chain, is implementing touchless, autonomous checkout systems in its stores. This technology allows customers to purchase items without going to a cash register. Instead, customers can sign up on the Circle K app, select the items they want, and simply walk out of the store with their purchases.
Implementation and Partnership
Circle K's parent company, Alimentation Couche-Tard Inc., has made a significant investment in frictionless technology. They have partnered with Standard AI, a Silicon Valley-based company, to retrofit existing Circle K stores with this technology. Standard AI's system uses a network of cameras mounted throughout the store to track customer movements and purchases.
Benefits and Goals
The implementation of frictionless technology in Circle K stores aims to enhance the shopping experience for customers and improve operational efficiency. By eliminating the need for traditional cash registers, employees can focus on providing a more personalized and engaging customer experience. The technology also offers benefits such as better analytics, improved staff performance, identification of inefficiencies, and assistance with loss prevention.
Gradual Implementation
While the goal is to eventually create a completely autonomous store, Circle K and Standard AI are taking a gradual approach. Initially, customers at the Circle K store in Tempe, Arizona, will still have the option to make purchases at the cash register using cash or card. Standard AI plans to install kiosks that accept credit and debit cards without requiring scanning. Eventually, the kiosks will also accept cash.
Privacy and Security
Standard AI and Circle K prioritize customer privacy and security. The technology developed by Standard AI does not involve facial recognition and does not store personal information about customers. The focus is on tracking movement and products within the store, not on identifying individuals.
Expansion and Future Plans
Standard AI has signed a multistore agreement with Circle K and plans to implement its technology in stores in Phoenix and Tucson. The company is committed to continuously improving its technology and plans to introduce new features based on customer data and feedback.
Conclusion
Circle K's adoption of touchless, autonomous checkout systems represents a significant step in retail innovation. By leveraging frictionless technology, Circle K aims to enhance the shopping experience for customers while improving operational efficiency. The partnership with Standard AI and the gradual implementation of the technology demonstrate Circle K's commitment to staying at the forefront of retail innovation.
