Laura stands in front of the line of people waiting at the door of the mini-market, puts her hands to her mouth, as if imitating a megaphone, and warns: "Does everyone have the app installed?"The motley group of office workers, tourists, some residents of downtown Seattle and a journalist with more curiosity than a real need for shopping is formed behind a tape, waiting to enter the establishment.Everyone has their smartphone in their hand, with their respective QR codes shining on the screens, ready to be read by the incoming turnstiles. Without this digital key there is no way to enter.Clearly, it is not just another location. For more than a year now, this concept, which was born as an experiment, has become what for many is the future of "offline" retail shopping.Amazon Go has the same products that can be found in any self-service in the United States, its dimensions are similar and the prices are neither cheaper nor more expensive.At first glance, it is another market, but with the particularity of having a clientele more attentive to the photos you can take of your shopping experience than of the products you really want to acquire.That it has become a tourist attraction responds to a disruptive component, simple at the first glance, but complex when the head is raised and the network of technologies involved for its functioning is seen: the total absence of payment boxes.The shops without ATMs are already common and are becoming the rule: the customer passes his purchases through the scanner, enters his card and leaves. They exist throughout the world and are becoming more common in the hypermarkets of Argentina.That there are no boxes adds an extra ingredient to the equation: how do you pay in a place where you simply take what you want and leave? The answer is artificial intelligence. Welcome to the future of retail.Lost in the supermarketSeattle's 7th Avenue runs through the center of the city, a district that is chosen as home by more and more technology firms.Minutes from the Canadian border, in the Pacific Northwest, the capital of the state of Washington has become one of the natural successors of Silicon Valley: its cost of living is lower than in Northern California and the ecosystem tech is one of the most robust in the nation.On this avenue stands an anodyne skyscraper, which only draws attention for its brutal height and for being the home of the company founded more than 20 years ago by the restless Jeff Bezos.On its ground floor, facing the street, Go has its doors open to anyone who has an active account in the e-commerce giant. You just have to download your exclusive app, login and ready, you can buy.The line in the path advances at a good pace: for each satisfied customer that leaves, a new one enters. After the small hall and its three steps, you descend to the shopping area and the dining room (strictly speaking, a space with a bar to eat). Once the pinwheel reads the QR code of the smartphone screen, which identifies each buyer, the "magic" begins.Despite being a clearly intuitive action, some of the curious in the row seem to have trouble entering. Laura, now assuming the role of assistant, indicates how the phone should be put in order for the reader to register it successfully. Task accomplished. Now, to buy.Inside, everything is neat: the floor, the gondolas and even the attendees, distributed throughout the room, look impeccable in their orange uniforms. Their task, a priori, does not seem to be very useful in the shopping experience, since they simply ask each new face with which they interact "Can I help you?", Which is answered in the vast majority of cases ( not to say all) with a kind, but sharp, "no, thank you".Is that the process once inside has nothing extraordinary. Take a reusable bag (the company offers them for free) and fill it with the products you want to buy, nothing more. The variety of the merchandise does not surprise either, since it points exclusively to edible products: packaged food, viands, snacks and drinks.For these reasons, the presence of almost a dozen attendees within space seems an exaggeration. However, there they are, smiling at the uninterrupted parade of curious people who enter to see what it is all about.The truly innovative Go experience occurs silently. At all times, Amazon's technology is working in the shadows, keeping track of each buyer and their movements within the enclosure. What do you take from the gondolas, what do not you take, where do you walk?As a hyperfuturist "big brother", the sensation that runs through the body is that of feeling observed all the time. Are we prepared to live in a world where this overhead view points us continuously? Is it normal to feel like a thief when leaving this place without interacting with any cashier? It looks like the fruit of science fiction, but it's 100% real.
What's behindIt may seem complex, but the concept behind Go is, broadly speaking, simple to understand.The first step of the experience is the aforementioned application, which works with the same account that you already have on Amazon.com.Within it, several options are displayed:- "Key", which is the QR code to enter- "Discover", with daily product recommendations- "Receipts", where you can check all purchases made- "Stores", to locate other locations throughout the United StatesOn the side of the building, things are more interesting. Amazon deployed an arsenal of cameras and sensors that follow each buyer throughout the experience. The QR, itself, gives the order to the system to follow the person who has just entered.Thus, a spatial monitoring is done, with which each movement is analyzed and which products are taken. The captured images create a three-dimensional representation of each individual in order to differentiate the buyers.The firm ensures that all these data, sensitive in regards to the security and privacy of its customers, are stored temporarily, while the purchase is made.In the gondolas, different weight and distance sensors can detect if a product was taken or left in its place. In addition, the software is sophisticated enough to distinguish labels and packaging.In the case of packaged fresh foods, codes are included that are dotted, easily visible so that the cameras can know, for example, what type of salad has been chosen.Amazon does not try to hide this background. The whole skeleton is in sight: the roof is full of hardware devices that are responsible for capturing the data that will be transformed into the purchase analysis of each new profile that enters the system.At the exit no additional step is required, one can simply leave without doing a "check-out". Minutes later, the platform will send the purchase ticket to the mail box and debit the amount of the credit card.Infallible system, open futureA bottle of water, a can of iced coffee and two cereal bars, the booty of the Amazon Go. One tries to deceive the system: take a product and leave it, change it by hand; any juggling that will cause the cameras to get confused and do their job badly.The "brain", however, does not fail. When the summary arrives at the app, all the products purchased, with their photo and corresponding price, are there. Nothing seems to have been left out of Amazon's "eye". A second visit, to have a second look and find new ways to deceive the proposal, gives the same results. 100% infallible.With this concept, the firm promises purchases "without rows, without boxes". In short, more agile. Is the premise fulfilled? Halfway: being a place of interest for tourists, many people crowd their entrance. Inside, the idea makes sense, but raises questions.Faced with these advances, its creators often argue that there is no need to fear for the loss of jobs that artificial intelligence replaces. In any case, in the case of Amazon Go, the concerns are justified. Are employees distributed in these locations necessary?An assistant who provides help to take products from a gondola does not seem to be necessary, much less when this type of retail becomes the norm.This question triggers reflections in the face of a world in which intelligent systems will be increasingly common on a daily basis. Despite their limitations, these platforms gain place in the consideration of companies.Amazon's plans accelerated this year, opening nine Go branches in Seattle, San Francisco and Chicago. Sources close to the program indicated that, by 2021, the figure would increase to 3,000 stores throughout the United States. The company has a clear advantage over other retail chains, as its giant Artificial Intelligence division is one of the most advanced in the world.Without going any further, Alexa is today the personal assistant most used in the homes of the world, over Google Assistant and Apple Siri. The only one capable of competing in this process of modernization of the retail segment is Walmart, which a few months ago closed an alliance with Microsoft (another power of artificial intelligence, also based in Seattle) to implement a similar project, even without a defined date.In one way or another, tomorrow's markets will be more "smart". This may be the technology that reigns in the retail industry, or other alternatives may arise. But there is one thing for sure: the absence of boxes will be a reality, at least in the northern hemisphere, where the winds of change are already blowing.