“Would you like to sign in with your palm?”
That was the question a cheerful Amazon employee asked when he greeted me last week at the opening of a Whole Foods Market in the Glover Park neighborhood of Washington. She happily added, “You can also start shopping by scanning the QR code in your Amazon app.”
“Let’s go for the palm,” I said.
In less than a minute, I scanned both hands on a newsstand and linked them to my Amazon account. Then I held my right palm over the turnstile reader to enter the most technologically advanced supermarket in the country.
For the next 30 minutes I shopped. I picked up a bag of cauliflower florets, grapefruit sparkling water, a packet of strawberries, and a packet of organic chicken sausages. Cameras and sensors registered all my movements and created a virtual shopping cart for me in real time. Then I just walked away, no cashier needed. Whole Foods – or rather Amazon – would bill my account later.
More than four years ago, Amazon bought Whole Foods for $13 billion. Now, the Amazon branding of the supermarket chain is physically complete, as evidenced by the revamped Whole Foods store in Glover Park.
For a long time, Amazon took only small steps to make its mark on more than 500 Whole Foods stores in the United States and Britain. The main proof of change was the discounts and free home delivery for Amazon Prime members.
But this 21,000-square-foot Whole Foods just north of Georgetown has catapulted Amazon’s involvement to the fore. Along with another prototype Whole Foods store, opening this year in Los Angeles, Amazon has designed my local grocer to be run almost entirely by tracking and robotic tools for the first time.
The technology, known as Just Walk Out, consists of hundreds of cameras with a divine view of customers. Sensors are placed under each apple, packet of oatmeal and boule multigrain bread. Behind the scenes, deep learning software analyzes store activity to detect patterns and increase cost accuracy.
The technology is similar to what’s in driverless cars. It identifies when we lift a product from a shelf, freezer or production bin; automatically specifies the goods; and charges us when we leave the store. Anyone with an Amazon account, not just Prime members, can shop this way and skip a checkout as the bill appears on our Amazon account.
Amazon has been testing such automation for more than four years, starting with 24 Amazon Go supermarkets and several Amazon Fresh supermarkets across the country. The palm scanning technology, known as Amazon One, is also licensed by others, such as a Hudson supermarket at Dallas Love Field Airport and Shaquille O’Neal’s Big Chicken restaurant at Climate Pledge Arena in Seattle.
Those stores were valuable experiments, said Dilip Kumar, Amazon’s vice president of physical retail and technology. The company sees Whole Foods as another step in its technology expansion into retail stores, he said.
“We observed areas that were causing friction for customers, and we worked diligently backwards to find ways to reduce that friction,” said Mr. Kumar. “We’ve always noticed that customers don’t like to queue at the checkout. It’s not the most productive use of their time, so we came up with the idea to build Just Walk Out.”
He declined to comment on whether Amazon plans to expand the technology to all Whole Foods stores.
My New York Times colleague Karen Weise, who serves Amazon out of Seattle, said the company was long-term, with the patience and money to run it slowly. That has allowed for many years to transform labor, retail and logistics, she said. Messages are only part of the ambitions.
The Whole Foods at Glover Park has been operating for over 20 years, a cornerstone of a neighborhood within walking distance of Embassy Row and the residence of the Vice President Naval Observatory. The store closed four years ago due to a dispute with the landlord and a rat infestation. Amazon announced last year that it would reopen the store as a Just Walk Out pilot project.
The rats may be gone, but not the neighborhood fear. The renovated store has sparked a lively local debate, with residents sparring about the Nextdoor community app and neighborhood email list about the store’s “dystopian” feel versus its “impressive technology.” Some neighbors reminisced about how the store invited people to just hang out, offering free samples and fluffy blueberry pancakes sold on weekends.
Alex Levin, 55, an 18-year-old resident of Glover Park, said people shouldn’t turn down the store’s changes.
“We need to understand the pros and cons of the technology and use it to our advantage,” he said. He added that he had tried to trick the cameras and sensors by putting a box of chicken nuggets in his shopping bag and then putting the item back in the freezer. Amazon was not fooled and was not charged for the gold nuggets, he said.
But others said they found errors in their bills and complained about the end of production per pound. Everything is now offered per piece, bundle or box. Some mourned the disappearance of the checkout line, where they perused magazines and last-minute grab bags. Many were suspicious of the tracking technology.
“It’s like George Orwell’s ‘1984,’” says Allen Hengst, 72, a retired librarian.
Amazon said it had no intention of using video and other Whole Foods customer information for advertising or its recommendation engine. Shoppers who do not want to participate in the experimental technology can enter the store without logging in and pay at self-checkout kiosks with a credit card or cash.
As a longtime customer of Glover Park’s Whole Foods, I had missed the dark, cramped, and often chaotic store and was excited to discover the changes. But somewhere between the palm scan and the six-pack banana bundles, I started to feel ambivalent.
I saw a sign at the entrance forbidding shoppers from taking photos or videos inside. My eyes drifted to the ceiling, where I saw hundreds of small black plastic boxes hanging from the rafters.
An employee jumped in. “Those are the cameras that will follow you through your shopping experience,” she explains ironically.
Several workers walked around the entrance to guide customers through check-in, while others stood behind the seafood counter, cheese station and production areas. Mr Kumar said the stores would always employ people, but I wondered for how long. Amazon, which is under scrutiny for its labor practices, said employee roles may change over time and become more focused on interacting with customers to answer questions.
There were early signs of a more self-service future. At the bakery, I looked for someone to cut my $4.99 Harvest bread and was directed to an industrial customer bread slicer. A small label warned: sharp knives. Keep your hands away from all moving parts.
mr. Kumar didn’t want to share data about the accuracy of Just Walk Out, so I tested the technology. I picked up an organic avocado and placed it on a pile of non-organic avocados. After walking through the store, I went back and picked up the same organic avocado. If the cameras and sensors worked properly, Amazon would track my actions and charge me for the organic avocado misplaced in the conventional bin.
When I was ready to leave, I had the option of using a self-checkout kiosk or skipping the process. I decided on the latter and again waved my hand over a turnstile in front of the exit. The arms of the tourniquet opened.
“You should receive your receipt within two to three hours,” said an employee at the exit.
I walked out. It felt uneasy, like being mistaken for a shoplifter.
An hour later, an email from Amazon landed in my inbox. A link sent me to my Amazon account for more information. It said my shopping experience had lasted 32 minutes and 26 seconds. My total bill was $34.35 – and I was charged correctly for the organic avocado.
