Morrisons is launching a ‘shop to light’ feature across hundreds of its stores, which allows shoppers searching for a product to tap a button in its app and have its electronic shelf label (ESL) flash a light.
ESLs are being rolled out to all 497 Morrisons stores, with around 200 already live with the technology. The supermarket has partnered with French tech firm Vusion Group on the project.
The ‘shop to light’ feature will sit within the product finder in-app tool in the Morrisons Now app. The tool will confirm the shopper is in the correct aisle of the product they are seeking, before blinking the light on the ESL when the shopper is looking in the right spot.
It is understood it will work in a similar way to Walmart’s Flash Tag app feature, which launched earlier this month. Walmart also partners with Vusion on its ESLs.
Morrisons group productivity director Gordon Macpherson told an audience at NRF Europe this month the supermarket is “currently in the process of developing our version” and “customers will be able to come in in a few weeks’ time and flash a label”.
Morrisons is already using the lights on the ESLs for staff to ‘pick to light’ online orders, Macpherson said.
Pickers are designated a colour as they go on their picking route around a store, with the ESLs flashing that colour beneath the product they next need to pick. The feature is currently being integrated beyond Morrisons’ own online orders for those picking for aggregator apps and Amazon orders.
“We’ve got lots and lots of different technology deployed across our shops, we’re moving very quickly to deploy more,” Macpherson said. “We’re making sure we’re really clear about all of the use cases on digital labels, what all of the technology is that needs to talk to the labels, and the benefit we get as a result of that use case and technology integration.”
Vusion Group works with a number of UK convenience retailers including Co-op, which is rolling out ESLs across its entire 2,400-store estate, scheduled to complete at the end of this year.
In December it signed a partnership with the world’s biggest retailer Walmart to add its tech to 4,600 stores in the US.
Other retailers are also leveraging the possibility of pick to light presented by ESLs. Tesco in June announced it was rolling out ESLs with Vusion rival Hanshow across 3,000 of its large-format and convenience stores, in what is understood to be the biggest ESL project in Europe. Tesco noted that the technology provides its stores with “a range of features that could improve operational routines in future”, including LEDs that will light up to help colleagues identify the right products when picking online orders.
“The rollout of digital shelf labels marks an important step in the modernisation of our stores, delivering benefits for both customers and colleagues,” said Kevin Tindall, Tesco UK operations MD at the time.
No comments yet