Innovation of the Week: Sainsbury’s trials checkout-free SmartShop payments in-store

What is it?

Grocery giant Sainsbury’s is making its scan & shop service checkout-free, letting shoppers pay on its SmartShop devices for the first time.

The grocer said that the trial aims to “reduce friction” and is being combined with a separate pilot of AI cameras at the self-checkout tills to crack down on the potential for shoplifting and theft.

Sainsbury’s is trialling the new payment-enabled SmartShop handsets in two of its stores in Richmond and Kempston, according to The Grocer.

Shoppers in those stores can use their SmartShop handsets as they would normally, but will be able to use their debit cards to pay at the end of the shop. Once the payment has been accepted, shoppers can then print a receipt at a physical bay or ask for an email receipt to be sent to them.

While shoppers using the SmartShop app on their phones have been able to pay in the app since 2022, Sainsbury’s said that research showed many shoppers prefer using the physical handsets to save phone battery.

Why does it matter?

For Sainsbury’s, the benefits of the trial—if it’s successful—are twofold. The first being that it will encourage more customers to use the technology and thus reduce friction at both manned tills and at self-checkouts.

“It’s a bit more ergonomic,” director of stores and customer experience at Sainsbury’s Darren Sinclair told The Grocer. “I think about this as trying to reduce friction, improve payment and simplify the shopping journey, as well as the future potential space.”

It will also give the grocery giant valuable information on not just what shoppers are buying, but literally how they shop in its stores.

“From a heatmapping perspective, we can see how people shop. We don’t see the physical customer, just see the heat, so we can see which ends are looked at, which screens are looked at and the flow around the store,” Sinclair explained.

“That’s massively insightful when we are working out store formats, or when we are doing Nectar screens for suppliers.”

Strategic implications

Streamlining the shopping experience and making it more frictionless will always be a winner for retailers, and that’s no exception for Sainsbury’s.

It fits into chief executive Simon Roberts’ goal to make Sainsbury’s stores “more efficient” and reduce the number of manned checkouts the grocery giant has.

Last year, the retailer unveiled larger, hybrid self-checkouts with conveyor belts to allow customers doing bigger shops to still utilise the technology.

For Roberts, it’s all about offering customers “a choice” on how they pay.

Winning strategies

• Technology to boost brand activity
• Customer experience
• Store and staff productivity