Is the launch of Amazon’s replenish button a sign of the future? Will retailers soon be able to know what products customers need, even before they do?
Amazon has launched a physical button called Dash that US members of its Prime service can install in their homes and press to replenish everyday products such as coffee capsules or toilet rolls. Rather than remembering to go online and make an order, or pop to the shops, consumers will just need to press a branded button and the order will be delivered the next day.
The idea behind Dash is to automate the shopping process without the customer really having to think about shopping. The aim of automating shopping is to streamline the experience and prevent customers from going to competitors to look for better deals.
“This is a good example of how automated ordering in grocery retail will become more important”
Miya Knights, IDC
Senior research analyst at IDC Miya Knights says the industry has seen a number of approaches to simplifying the re-ordering process, such as the ability to scan a product’s barcode into a retailer’s app. “But this is a one-touch, one-handed, and branded experience,” she says.
“This is a good example of how automated ordering in grocery retail will become more important going forward, as time-poor consumers eschew the weekly physical supermarket shop. Amazon already offers subscription services, so the Dash button will enhance this approach, so customers ‘never run out’ of their favourite items.”
Digital v Physical
The scheme reaffirms the etailer’s continued efforts to blur the lines between shopping in a digital and physical world.
As well as its experiments with delivery drones, Amazon is even envisioning a store without payment after recently filing for a patent for use of in-store technology that will allow customers to delay payment.
Technology such as RFID and cameras could be used to identify products leaving stores and customers could be charged after exiting with goods and then sent digital confirmation.
But Amazon is not the first retailer to blur these lines, or even install buttons in customers’ homes.
French electronics firm Darty sells a button for customers’ homes that will connect them to its helpdesk within 60 seconds. Customers pay €25 (£20) for the device and will be charged a €3 monthly fee for assistance relating to television, audio and household appliances.
Internet of Things
These types of devices all make up what the technology industry has dubbed the ‘internet of things’ (IoT), where connected devices such as household appliances, smart devices and even street furniture like lamp posts ‘talk to each other’ via the internet
And Knights believes it will be the consumers driving the adoption of IoT as they start to connect devices in their homes.
“We are also seeing IoT principles applied to home automation, with Hive (from British Gas) and Nest (Google) both allowing users to remotely control the heating for their homes,” she added.
“So it is heartening to see Amazon is also embracing IoT. But I think it is a very basic, early example of what’s possible that has only really been designed to boost its Prime business. And we will have to wait and see if consumers are happy to have a multitude of these buttons in use around their home.”
Smart fridges
Another example of the potential of automated shopping is the smart fridge. While in its infancy, a future internet connected fridge could tell when a customer is out of milk and instruct their preferred grocer to replenish their items.
Sarah Eccleston, Cisco’s director for enterprise networks and IoT, UK and Ireland, says these fridges are the “IoT nirvana” and are not that far away.
“The fridge knows you’ve taken a bottle of milk out that is near empty and haven’t put it back, and the local store is also connected to the internet, so Waitrose in Kensington, for example, will know who is running out of milk and because of loyalty cards they will know when customers are likely to do their shop,” she says.
Eccleston said that allows retailers to plan their inventory to a greater degree of accuracy meaning customers will never walk into a shop which has run out of the product they want.
“The Dash button gets people used to things becoming more automated”
Sarah Eccleston, Cisco
“In the meantime, until you get to the point where everything is connected to the internet, one stage is the Dash button that is giving you a way of telling the internet that you need a product – it still involves you doing something, but in the long term you won’t need to, the product will tell the internet.”
“The Dash button is a lovely intermediate step and it gets people used to things becoming more automated,” she says.
But with the average household appliance purchase cycle being five years or more, coupled with the high price tags of white goods, it may be some time before customers start replacing big-ticket items with new internet-connected models. For now customers will have to make do with a single press of Dash buttons dotted around the home.
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