Aldi has ended its trial of Amazon-style checkout-free shopping by converting its one and only Shop & Go store to a standard urban branch.
The store in Greenwich, south London, has become a standard Aldi Local with self-checkouts.
The Shop & Go store opened in January 2022, a time when expectations were high that ‘just walk out’ shopping could take off. Two months earlier, Amazon had announced a plan to have 260 Fresh stores in the UK by 2025, and Tesco and Sainsbury’s were also trialling their versions.
But the technology has not gained traction. Amazon’s UK estate never grew beyond about 20 stores, and in September last year it announced plans to close all 19.
Aldi’s Shop & Go store used more than 330 AI-powered HD cameras to monitor every item a shopper picked or put down. It enabled customers to simply leave through an automatic barrier with their shopping, and the bill would be charged to their payment card via the Aldi Shop & Go app.
However, the process was not infallible. The Grocer picked up five bananas on opening day and was charged for six.
Many shoppers were also unprepared for the requirement to download an app just to get in, with several staff on hand to explain the process in the early days.
In 2023, Piers Corbyn, brother of MP Jeremy Corbyn, called it a “new dystopian store” and demanded the shop take cash by leaving the right change for strawberries on the help desk and pushing his way through barriers to leave. “If you want to call the police, call the police,” he said in video shared on social media at the time. “I have paid by legal tender.”
The store also appeared to provide challenges for Aldi which required changes to the app. In January last year, The Grocer revealed a change meant app users could be charged a £10 refundable deposit for their shopping in the store, even if they did not go anywhere near it. By August, the store had gained self-checkouts, though anyone choosing to use the ‘just walk out’ method could still do so.
In the latest update, the app is now telling shoppers: “News: our Shop & Go trial has now come to an end as planned, meaning your Greenwich High Road store will remain open as an Aldi Local.
“Like our other stores, you’d find the same great product range and unbeatable Aldi prices, as well as our self-service checkouts.”
An Aldi spokesperson confirmed: “Whilst our Shop & Go trial has now come to an end as planned, our Greenwich High Road store will remain open as an Aldi Local, ensuring customers can still get everything they need at unbeatable Aldi prices.”
The spokesperson said Aldi had learned a great deal from the trial.
It is not the only supermarket to retreat from checkout-free shopping. Sainsbury’s deployed Amazon’s Just Walk Out technology in its SmartShop Pick & Go store in Holborn, but stripped it out last year, leaving a kiosk with a till and two self-checkouts as payment methods.
Tesco has four GetGo stores, using technology from Trigo, but all give shoppers the option of using a checkout if they want to.
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