AI Isn’t Always the Answer

Sometimes, retailers just need to focus on going back to the basics

1/5/2024

Associates enchanted shoppers at a Tampa, Fla., Walmart on Christmas Eve with carols sung in Spanish.

OPINION: EDITOR'S NOTE

Over the holidays, I was doing some last-minute — OK, very last-minute — shopping on Christmas Eve. I was picking out some cilantro at my local U.S. Walmart when, suddenly, I thought I could hear people singing on the other side of the store. Not just singing, but singing in Spanish. Christmas carols in Spanish, to be exact.

Eventually, the singing grew louder. It was a group of Walmart associates (around 10), and they were walking toward me in the produce department — singing, clapping, cheering — and one of them had a trumpet. I stopped for a moment and watched not just the carolers, but also the shoppers who had paused and were watching them. The looks on their faces — adults and children alike — were euphoric. Some of them even sang, clapped and danced along to the sounds. It’s not every day that you go to the store to buy produce and are serenaded. It was a magical moment that even weeks later, I’m still thinking about. I’m pretty sure that the other shoppers are also still thinking about it, especially when it’s time for them to decide where to shop for next week’s groceries.

I’ve been thinking about how this experience relates to the “AI revolution” in retail, over the past couple of weeks as we at Progressive Grocer engage in intricate planning for the new year. This month, The Sun newspaper asked generative AI chatbot ChatGPT to pretend to be Nostradamus — the 16th-century soothsayer — and make some prophecies for 2024. The bot predicted that a “revolution” of its own kind is coming that will represent the “fusion of human ingenuity and artificial intelligence.”

This technology is poised to have a major impact on the coverage, content and events at Progressive Grocer. From our GroceryTech event in June to our Grocery Impact event in November, GenAI is the hot topic that everyone wants to learn more about: specifically, harnessing the AI opportunity to accelerate growth.

If you’re planning to attend NRF’s Big Show in New York this month, there will be at least 35 educational sessions focused on AI (I may have missed a few). Meanwhile, FMI Midwinter, also this month, has at least five sessions scheduled on the implications of AI for the grocery industry.

Certainly, this year, grocery retailers will face an onslaught of pressure to embrace this powerful tool as a way to cure every operational ill. From point of sale to pricing compliance to inventory management, social commerce, networking visibility, retail media and so much more, AI is forever changing operations. But retailers need to understand exactly what their challenges and opportunities are before investing in more AI applications during what’s shaping up to be another challenging year for the bottom line.

The ChatGPT Nostradamus referred to it as “human ingenuity.” But I think sometimes what’s needed to gain a competitive advantage is just a little bit of magic, going back to the basics of what makes shoppers go to your store in the first place: a magical experience. After all, there’s no AI solution that will put on a glittery Santa hat, strap on a guitar, sing Christmas carols while parading around the store and spark joy for hundreds of shoppers.

At least for now.