Hello again and welcome to Vending Insight 43, ‘Are You ‘Knee-Jerk’ Or ‘Joined-Up’?’, brought to you with the assistance of our friends at Vianet Smart Machines in association with Vendman, the UK’s Number One ERP software for vending operators.
Are You ‘Knee-Jerk’ Or ‘Joined Up’?
‘Have you noticed that, these days, whenever there’s an issue at work or at home, the first reaction of many is to throw IT at it, what ever it is. Sometimes IT solves the problem; usually it doesn’t. As strategies go, it’s more knee-jerk than joined-up.’ A thought provoking article from Vianet’s Craig McIntyre, HERE
Keeping Cashless Consumers On Your Side (Internet Retailing)
Vending Insight 43 – ‘The future of retail should not view the checkout as a siloed process, but one that integrates into the rest of the shopping experience. The ultimate goal is for payments and whatever process a customer picks to become unnoticed.’ What’s your opinion? A compelling argument, HERE
Japan Convenience Stores To Offset 2% Tax Hike With Discounts For Cashless Purchases (Nikkei Asian Review)
Remarkably, Japan is lagging behind in the dash to cashless. Now, the government is introducing a programme that awards points for cashless payment methods, including credit cards, electronic money and mobile payments. Amazon Japan and supermarket chains also plan to offer immediate discounts. There are other options available under the program, such as awarding loyalty points that can be used for future purchases. It’s all HERE
Vending Insight 43
87 Payment Apps Face An Uphill Battle To Turn India Cashless (Gulf News)
…Meanwhile, India is desperate to catch up to China in terms of squeezing out cash and there’s massive competition amongst cashless payment app providers to get a piece of the action. The upshot is that Indians will continue to face a bewildering array of payments apps provided by Facebook Inc., Google, Amazon.com Inc. and others, in contrast to China where two home-grown technology giants dominate the market. There’s more than one way to skin a cat, as you’ll see HERE
Partnering With Amazon Has Seen In-Store Footfall Go Up For Kohl’s (Diginomica)
Vending Insight 43: Kohl’s Amazon alliance is returning increased footfall to bolster its omni-channel thinking. Diginomica has previously gone on record about the retail sector’s reaction to the ‘Big Bad’ that is Amazon and how that reaction can manifest itself in various ways. Will it be the ‘rabbit in the headlights approach? The ‘everything has to be online so that we’re just like Amazon’ delusion? Or will it be a pragmatic acceptance that it’s possible to work with Amazon to your own benefit? A few surprises, perhaps, HERE
Why Should We Build Recommender Systems Without Feedback Loops? (Analytics India)
Modern digital applications mostly run on personalised user experience achieved through recommender systems. Movies, music, retail products and even choosing a partner on a dating site, involves a lot of feedback loops that are made robust through choices that the user makes. A key source of bias is ignoring the fact that a choice is made from a cherry-picked and limited subset of options, leading to a self-reinforcing feedback loop. Options that were never presented are unfairly penalised… Get your egghead on to read this, HERE
Say No to the ‘Cashless Future’ — and to Cashless Stores (ACLU)
The American Civil Liberties Union makes a strong case for halting the rise of the cashless society; but you have to think the organisation will have as much success in turning back this tide as King Canute had with his… It’s well worth a read; but ‘shutting the stable door after the horse has bolted’? It’s HERE
King Power Stadium Tackles Queuing With Cashless Concourses (LCFC.com)
Matchday concourses at King Power Stadium have gone cashless this season. With Leicester City’s home matches regularly selling out, cutting down concourse queuing times pre-match and at half-time has been a focus for the Club and its food and beverage providers. The introduction of cashless tills to the majority of kiosks last season served to considerable reduce average waiting times, as well as improving security – particularly during busy periods, so now, they’ve rolled out cashless throughout the ground. Full story, HERE
Cashless Readers ‘Boost Cash Vending Sales’ (Intergame)
A recent study commissioned by USA Technologies reports that cashless technology increases cash spending in vending machines. In the study, carried out by Michigan State University, it was found that cashless technology delivered better sales growth in machines producing under US$2,000 in annual sales, than it did for higher performing machines. HERE
Tractor Supply’s Robust Omni-Channel Efforts Drive Growth (Yahoo Finance)
If it can help sell more tractors… ‘TSCO, the Tractor Supply Company, is performing exceedingly well, thanks to its solid omni-channel endeavors including store expansion and technological advancements. Moreover, the company targets the integration of physical and digital operations to offer consumers a seamless shopping experience through its “ONETractor” initiative.’ Interesting gossip from down on the farm, HERE
We hope you enjoyed this issue, Vending Insight 43. Vending Insight 44 will be with you soon. See you then.
Meanwhile, Planet Vending’s Vending Insight Archive is HERE
