It’s Friday, the weekend is almost upon us, so let’s kick back and reflect on another eventful week for the retail systems space. Here’s your briefing on the most important stories from the past five days, including Asda, Too Good To Go, Starbucks, Walmart, Roblox, Bambuser, Zara, CarrefourSA, Simbe, Burger King UK, Uber Eats, and Dexory.
1. Asda ramps up food waste reduction push as grocery giant expands Too Good To Go partnership in UK
Asda is extending its partnership with Too Good To Go, a surplus food marketplace.
Too Good To Go offers any surplus, but still edible, food to app users in the form of ‘Surprise Bags’ for them to purchase from local retailers.
The digital platform will now be available to use across nearly 1,000 sites, including Asda supermarket and Asda Express stores, as well as foodservice sites located in Asda stores such as LEON, Greggs, Sbarro and Subway.
Customers will be able to purchase surplus stock at a fraction of its original price via the Too Good To Go app. As part of a Surprise Bag, a variety of food items will be available, including chilled items, ready meals, food to go, prepared fruit or salads, bakery products, or produce with use-by dates such as dairy, meat, fish or poultry.
Surprise Bags from Asda Supermarkets will be available for £3.30 and will include minimum £9 worth of goods. Bags from Asda Express, LEON, Greggs, Sbarro and Subway will also be available. The bags will vary in price depending on the contents, but could include breakfast items, lunch, and dinner food, and also a cakes and pastries bag.
The roll-out follows a trial across a number of Asda’s supermarkets, convenience stores and foodservice sites. Since forming the original partnership with Too Good To Go in 2021 through the former EG Group convenience sites, over 2,000,000 kilograms of perfectly good food has been saved from going to waste.
2. Lots of fun but extremely expensive: Aldi shutters Trigo powered Shop & Go store in Dutch city of Utrecht
Aldi is binning its mobile app centric, cashier-free supermarket project in Utrecht, Holland.
“It was a fun experiment and we learned a lot,” Florian Scholbeck, Aldi’s International Head of Communications. “But the investments are very big.”
The retailer will now test the system in Eindhoven in a store selling a full range of products. The ability to pay by traditional means will also be made available.
Utrecht was a 3,982 square feet location where shoppers walked in, selected their items, and walked out without having to queue at the checkout lane or scan any items.
In its largest store format to date, Trigo applied its algorithms to shelf sensors and ceiling mounted cameras which analysed anonymised shoppers’ movements and product choices.
Payments and receipts were settled digitally.
3. The clock is ticking! Deadline looms to enter retail technology sector’s number one awards event
There are only three weeks left to submit your entries for the 2024 RTIH Innovation Awards.
Deadline for submissions is Friday, 25th October.
The awards, sponsored by CADS, 3D Cloud, Retail Technology Show 2025, and Business France celebrate global tech innovation in a fast moving omnichannel world.
It’s free to enter and you can do so across multiple categories.
Download our handy guide to entering the 2024 RTIH Innovation Awards.
Key 2024 dates:
Friday, 25th October: Award entry deadline
Tuesday, 29th October: 2024 shortlist revealed
30th October-6th November: Judging days
Thursday, 21st November: Winners announced at the 2024 RTIH Innovation Awards ceremony, to be held at RIBA’s 66 Portland Place HQ in Central London.
For all entry related queries, please email our Editor and Founder, Scott Thompson: scott.thompson@retailtechinnovationhub.com