Wednesday, December 21, 2011 | 05:04 |
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Koreans are the second most hard working people in the world and grocery shopping isn’t their favorite pastime. Tesco didn’t go out to solve this problems for Korea when it went there. Instead it wanted to be #1 in Korea. It wasn’t able to beat the incumbent E-Mart which had more stores than Tesco (Homeplus in Korea).
Taking an hour a week for grocery shopping can be a real drag, so the company devised a way to have the store come to the people. Tesco set up virtual grocery stores in locations like subway/metro stations so that people can literally do their grocery shopping while waiting for the train.
The walls are plastered with posters that resemble the aisles and shelves of a supermarket. They’re lined from top to bottom with the products you’d normally see while grocery shopping. The only difference is that you can’t just grab the product and check out. The groceries each have a QR code which the shopper scans with a smartphone camera and adds to a shopping list. When the shopper has scanned all the codes for all the groceries needed, he pays using his phone and the groceries are then delivered to his home.
There’s just no time to make a trip to the grocery store some weeks. Tesco Home Plus is a supermarket chain in Korea that’s vying to be rated No. 1, and leave its second place spot to E-Mart, its main competitor. E-Mart has a greater number of stores than Tesco, but the company is determined to become the No. 1 grocery chain without increasing the number of stores. How does it plan to do this? Why, with the use of a smartphone, of course.
According to Tesco, Koreans are the second hardest working people in the world, and time is literally money. Taking an hour a week for grocery shopping can be a real drag, so the company devised a way to have the store come to the people. Tesco set up virtual grocery stores in locations like subway/metro stations so that people can literally do their grocery shopping while waiting for the train.
The walls are plastered with posters that resemble the aisles and shelves of a supermarket. They’re lined from top to bottom with the products you’d normally see while grocery shopping. The only difference is that you can’t just grab the product and check out. The groceries each have a QR code which the shopper scans with a smartphone camera and adds to a shopping list. When the shopper has scanned all the codes for all the groceries needed, he pays using his phone and the groceries are then delivered to his home.
QR-code-based shopping allows the customer to shop at more locations, many of which are more convenient than making a trip to the grocery store. A big advantage of getting your groceries delivered right to your door is that in major cities where driving isn’t really an option, people are left lugging heavy bags on the train and up a couple of flights of stairs before they reach their door.
A nitpicky gripe to this way of shopping is that checking out the product’s information will be impossible. More specifically, the shopper won’t be able to turn the product around to see the nutritional facts. As far as I can tell, there’s no way to look at this in the store displays. There may be an option available once you scan your QR code, but otherwise, people will literally be buying food based on a photo. You also don’t get to choose what produce you buy, which is a nice part about shopping in a store. Do you like your bananas a little more un-ripened than ripe? You’ll get whatever the store decides to deliver, meaning you can’t pick and choose the exact product that you want. A small price to pay for convenience we suppose.
This isn’t the first case of ordering groceries to be delivered to your home, but it’s unique since you’re not just sitting in your home clicking on a website. The customer actually gets to stroll down the “aisle” while waiting for a train to arrive and visually make their choices.
The results of the initiative are impressive also in terms of numbers: online sales between November 2010 and January 2011 increased by 130 percent, with the number of registered members rising by 76 percent.
This isn’t the first case of ordering groceries to be delivered to your home, but it’s unique since you’re not just sitting in your home clicking on a website. The customer actually gets to stroll down the “aisle” while waiting for a train to arrive and visually make their choices. An besides this virtual mall is it doesn’t even have to be replenished!
Tesco has not only saved monies in supply chain and warehousing costs but it has also given Koreans an easy and sticky way to shop, without actually waiting in a line. All the waiting they were doing was for their next train either to work or back home. Metro stations and public places will suddenly become hot real estate destinations. Tesco’s solution has once again proved that you don’t have to change the world. You just have to make something a little better.
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