The tech company behind Woolworths smart carts says its carts are designed to increase impulse purchases, with the ability to send personalized ads based on the customer’s shopping habits and even which aisle they’re in. it is in the store.

The supermarket giant has rolled out its new smart trolleys to several stores across Sydney and its suburbs, including Kellyville, Windsor, Lane Cove and Parramatta.

Customers use their Everyday Rewards loyalty accounts to unlock a smart tablet which is then clipped onto a shopping cart, allowing them to scan products while shopping.

Woolworths trolleys do not currently store location information or display product advertising, but smart trolleys overseas are already used by supermarkets to track shoppers in stores and send them advertisements and promotions personalized.

In Europe, Finnish supermarket chain Kesko introduced smart carts made by technology company Navigine to its 98 stores, which the company said increased average customer spending by 6 percent.

In Australia, Woolworths has partnered with Chinese retail technology company Hanshow to co-create its smart carts.

The company boasts online that its “Smart Trolley solution” has the power to use location data as customers move around the store to offer promotions related to nearby products.

“By leveraging customer data and insights, our system presents relevant advertisements and promotions to customers as they shop,” Hanshow explains on its site.

Woolworths and other retailers already use personalized online ads that offer deals based on a customer’s shopping history or browsing habits.

Although the grocer did not indicate it would follow others in introducing targeted in-store advertising, Greens senator and digital rights spokesperson David Shoebridge said the ability of smart trolleys to do so to do was disturbing.

“This is incredibly intrusive technology, literally tracking your movements, your purchase history in real time as you move from aisle to aisle,” Senator Shoebridge said.

“In many ways it’s like transforming the whole supermarket into those last five meters, that challenge you run on your way to the checkout.”

A Woolworths spokesperson told the ABC customer feedback on its smart trolleys had been overwhelmingly positive.

“Customers at our trial stores told us it helped them control their budget because they could track their spending and saved them time scanning and bagging while they shop,” said the spokesperson.

“We are continuing to gather feedback from our customers and our team with a view to introducing the Scan&Go Trolley to more of our supermarkets nationally, along with the ability to pay for our groceries on the device. »

The company says the carts help customers stick to their budget and identify total savings from purchasing discounted products.

National leader David Littleproud told the ABC after the public review of supermarket prices that grocers should work to ensure their prices are fair.

“Woolworths may be focused on shopping carts, but its real priority must be fairness at checkout, both for families and farmers,” Mr Littleproud said.

“We have already seen that so-called promotions have been proven to be fake, so shoppers risk being fooled into thinking they are buying ‘specials’ when that is not the case, that it’s about a smart cart or their own purchasing power.”

The Coalition has proposed an enforceable code of conduct for supermarkets, with multi-million dollar penalties for violations, as well as powers for courts to break up supermarket giants if they abuse their market power.

Executives from Woolworths and Coles are due to appear next week at a supermarket investigation by the consumer watchdog.

Electronic stickers open the door to dynamic pricing

Smart carts are just one of the new technologies being adopted globally by supermarkets.

The same company that Woolworths uses for its smart trolleys also sells electronic shelf labels, digital replacements for the price stickers that have become increasingly common in supermarkets.

Digital labels allow supermarkets to issue price updates almost instantly, without the need for staff to manually update prices.

Woolworths, Coles and other Australian chains have been rolling out electronic tags in their stores for several years.

Supermarkets have rejected suggestions they could use technology to introduce ‘price gouging’ tactics in food products, where prices can be adjusted several times a day to match peak periods and customer demand .

Internationally, some supermarkets are already using electronic price tags to enable dynamic pricing.

Norwegian supermarket chain REMA 1000 has been using dynamic pricing for over a decade and at certain times of the year there are up to 2,000 price changes per day on his products – or six times per day for a single product – which he says has helped reduce food waste on products soon to expire.

In the United States, Senators Elizabeth Warren and Bob Casey recently wrote to US grocery giant Kroger to express concerns that installing electronic labels on shelves could pave the way for a “transition to dynamic pricing”, as given that the company has also partnered with a company that uses AI and machine learning to provide dynamic pricing technology.

Kroger responded that it would only use electronic labels to further lower prices for customers.

The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission notes that price gouging is not illegal, but businesses must not make false or misleading statements about their prices.

Senator Shoebridge said these tactics were legal “until they weren’t.”

“We are trying to make dynamic pricing of concert tickets illegal,” said Senator Shoebridge.

“If this trial continues and joins other business plans such as Woolies and Coles, we might ban dynamic pricing for concert tickets, but we will find that we are subject to dynamic pricing for milk and bread.

“That’s why we need governments to be vigilant and agile in this space, to regulate the worst of these predatory activities.”