Review of Future Shop Initiative Metro Group

METRO Group is the largest retail group in Germany and the fifth  largest retailer in the world. It operates 2370 stores in 28 countries  across Europe and Asia, which generated more than €53 billion annual revenue in 2003. The company particularly wanted to explore wireless, RFID, NFC, Smart Card and many content delivery technologies. Video made ​​by Future Shop Metro Group illustrates the implementation of technologies that they have developed to facilitate the people to shop easily.

Here are the technologies that exist in the video:

·         Smart Fridge

This technology automatically detects the existing stock of goods in the fridge, so we no longer need to check the contents of the fridge manually. This technology is cool and I think every house needs it.

·         Smart Washing Machine

This technology can detect the material and color of the clothes in the washing machine, so if there are different colors of clothing that cause fade, can be resolved with the Smart Washing Machine. I think this technology is very clever and definitely needed, especially for people who don’t know how to wash clothes.

·         Electronic Shopping List

This technology connected to the Smart Fridge so we can immediately put empty stock of goods into a shopping list on Future Card. I think this technology is needed as it helps us in finding and remembering what items are to be purchased.

·         Future Card

Future Card is a customer’s ID that contains detail information about the coustumer and also a list of items to be purchased. I think this technology is needed for store in order to find out the information and the needs of the cutomers in general.

·         Smart Trolley

This technology is able to detect and display the items that we put in the trolley automatically as well as how the number and price of these items. I think this technology is very helpful because it can directly show the price of the goods and calculated the total cost of the items on trolley.

·         Smart Shelves

This technology can detect the stock of goods that it would run out at the store, then can immediately provide notification to employees in order to directly restock again. I think this technology is needed for store because it can facilitate the employment of employees in checking the stock of goods.

·         Smart Information Terminal

This technology provides detailed information about all items, either description, price, location, and even recipes and ingredients to make by your own and can be sent directly to your cell phone. I think this is the most important technology and should exist in every store so that customers can get information easily.

·         Display Advertising

This technology display the ad of a product.  The ad appears on a screen placed right in the shelf products that will attract the attention of customers. I think this technology is very helpful in the promotion of goods for the store. Attractive design certainly attract the attention of customers.

·         Smart Scales with RFID

This technology is capable of accurately weighing goods and equipped with RFID so it can immediately know the name of an employee at the cashier. I think this technology is highly efficient for employees because it can save time and no longer need to manually enter the employee’s name when selling goods.

·         Smart Dressing Room

This technology allows us to choose clothes that fit with us without having to try it first, to use this technology is quite easily just by standing in front of it and press the start button and the system will take a photo of you and display it on the screen, then choose the clothes and colors to suit your taste. I think it 's really cool because we don’t need to use the fitting room to try on clothes that we will buy, the clothes will virtually displayed on our bodies, but personally I prefer to try it for myself.

·         Smart Mirror

This technology allows us to make your face up virtually, the use of this technology is almost similar to the Smart Dressing Room but the photos only takes the face and then put the make up virtually with ornamental tools and colors that suit your taste. I think this technology is very helpful, especially for women who want to have a suitable makeup for her, and also for men who want to look beautiful  can use it.

·         Future Check-Out ( Smart Chip )

This technology instantly connects all the items on the Smart Trolley with a cashier machine in the payment process . I think this is very effective technology to solve the long queues problem so it can save a lot of time .

The issue of smart technology is already heard long ago , but for the implementation itself has not been done . When I saw the video, the Future Shop was very modern so I really feel amazed , because these technologies are really smart and effective for stores and customers . In addition , this technology also provides a comfort feeling for the customers because it can provide all the necessary information in real time and thus enable consumers to shop easily .

However, the technology also take a long time to applied and the price for applying the technology is also expensive .For myself, I doubt if Future Shop will work well if applied in Indonesia , but I still hope there will be in Indonesia .