Nice update from Retail OCD. The winning self-service supplier will not be the one with the most sensors; it will be the one that can prove a sustainable retail operating model and explain it credibly to shoppers, store associates, regulators, and procurement.
1. Smart Carts Have Crossed the “Pilot Chasm” — But Operational Reality Is Biting
KroGo is now in 1,000+ Kroger stores, which means smart-cart self-checkout is no longer experimental; it is a live operational technology at scale. For the kiosk industry, this is validation that the hardware (scales, cameras, handle-mounted payment screens, anti-theft locks) is durable enough for daily retail use.
The catch: The technology works, but the human infrastructure around it is fraying. Kroger’s workforce has shrunk by ~65,000 in four years, so the same staff who were told the carts would “redeploy” cashiers are now drowning in cart fleet management, recharging, app troubleshooting, and loss prevention.
Significance for your world: Self-service vendors can no longer sell on “labor savings” alone. The industry needs to start designing for staff augmentation, not just labor displacement — or retailers will face a backlash from stretched-thin employees that slows adoption.
2. The “Surge Pricing” Narrative Threatens All In-Store Self-Service Tech
The most important warning in the newsletter is not about hardware failure, but about narrative contamination. Customers are beginning to associate smart carts with Electronic Shelf Labels (ESL) and, by extension, with dynamic/surge pricing and privacy invasion.
Significance for your world: This is a reputation risk for the entire kiosk and self-service category. If smart carts, ESLs, and other in-store automation technologies get painted with the same skeptical brush by unions or politicians, adoption could be regulated or consumer-trust-limited before the tech matures. The kiosk industry needs to get ahead of this story — emphasizing transparency, fixed pricing, and customer control — rather than letting opponents define the narrative.
3. Value Retailers Are Becoming Sophisticated Digital Experience Destinations
The Marshalls field report shows a value-priced retailer successfully deploying digital entrance screens, organized checkout experiences, and strong wayfinding — essentially creating a “premium feel” without premium prices. The newsletter even suggests Marshalls should consider ESLs in higher-value, frequently repriced categories (hair tools, shoes).
Significance for your world: This expands the addressable market for self-service and digital signage vendors. It is not just grocery and big-box anymore; off-price and “treasure hunt” retail formats are now viable candidates for kiosk, digital signage, and ESL integration — provided the technology can scale consistently across hundreds of inconsistent store footprints.
4. The B2B Pricing Lesson: Sustainable Partnerships Beat “Winning the Negotiation”
The opening essay on wholesale pricing is a meta-lesson for kiosk vendors. The author warns manufacturers against walking in with a “take our price or leave it” attitude, and against pushing price increases simply to hit internal numbers without strategic justification.
Significance for your world: Self-service technology (kiosks, smart carts, ESLs) is a high-ticket B2B sale with ongoing service, software, and support costs. The newsletter’s core argument — that pricing must be built on transparent math, joint business planning, and trust — applies directly to how kiosk vendors negotiate with retailers. A vendor undercutting competitors to win a rollout, then bleeding money on service, hurts the whole industry when they fail or raise prices later.
Bottom Line
For kioskindustry.org, this issue is significant because it captures the industry’s inflection point: self-service hardware is proven and scaling, but its future success now depends on operational sustainability, narrative control, and B2B trust — not just technical capability.
This newsletter matters to KioskIndustry.org because it shows that retail self-service is no longer judged only on speed or novelty. Smart carts, electronic shelf labels, digital signage, payments, computer vision, and kiosks are now evaluated as part of a broader trust-and-operations system: can retailers operate them reliably, staff exceptions, protect margins, prevent shrink without harassing honest shoppers, explain pricing, and preserve a good customer experience?
Kroger’s KroGo smart carts illustrate the issue. The technology can make shopping and payment faster, but success depends on fleet charging and maintenance, staff support, payment uptime, loss-prevention accuracy, and a dignified response when a cart locks or flags a paid shopper. False positives are especially damaging because they erase the convenience promise and can make customers feel accused.
The newsletter’s strongest point is that public concern over electronic shelf labels and possible “surge pricing” may spill over onto other in-store technologies. Shoppers often see digital price tags, cameras, loyalty apps, smart carts, and in-cart payment as one connected surveillance-and-pricing system. Retailers therefore need clear messaging on pricing practices, data collection, privacy, and what happens when the technology makes an error. Recent scrutiny of Kroger’s electronic shelf labels shows that even when retailers deny surge pricing, the capability to change prices quickly can create skepticism.cincinnati+2
For vendors, the pricing discussion reinforces the need for transparent, sustainable commercial models. Self-service suppliers must justify not only hardware price but total cost of ownership: software, connectivity, field service, payments, integrations, maintenance, replacement devices, accessibility, and store labor. The winning vendor is unlikely to be the one with the most sensors; it will be the one that can show the retailer a credible long-term operating and ROI model.
The Marshalls observations add an important reminder: good retail experience still begins with fundamentals—clean stores, visible signage, logical wayfinding, effective checkout, and usable merchandising. Digital screens, ESLs, and self-service tools only help when they are placed well, accessible, reliable, and supported by a consistent store operation.
Best to consider self-service after the pilot: smart-cart operations, false-positive management, ESL and pricing trust, total-cost-of-ownership pricing, and accessibility/equivalent-service requirements for autonomous retail.
This Issue: The Real Math Behind B2B Pricing, KroGo in the Wild, Marshalls From The Field and Retail Be Crazy for Ducks
Each week we dig into what wasn’t said on our podcast
Newsletter — Beyond The Mic
THIS WEEK: Spilling The Tea On Wholesale Pricing
Pricing is really a test of the relationship between manufacturer and retailer, not just numbers on a spreadsheet.
“Pricing isn’t a number, it’s a relationship test”
—Jason Christensen, Chief Revenue Officer, GSC Technologies Inc.
If you’re a manufacturer who’s building your pricing strategy around what you think a retailer will tolerate, you’re already in trouble. The real work starts much earlier, with the bill of materials, the cost structure, the data and a clear understanding of what it actually takes to make the retailer’s business work.
The fastest way to damage a retailer relationship is to walk in and say “take our price or leave it”, without being able to show the math behind it.
And there’s an even harder truth. Sometimes the right answer is to walk away.
A manufacturer losing a dollar a unit with the promise of “making it up in volume” isn’t executing a strategy, it’s slowly bleeding to death. The same goes for leadership teams that push through price increases simply to hit a number without asking whether the increase is truly strategic, or just tactical.
The Other Side Of the Sandwich
Retailers are under enormous pressure to protect margin, so they squeeze suppliers. The retailer then gets the PR win when they announce price cuts across thousands of products. Walmart’s recent back-to-school and grocery rollback push is a good example of this. The customer sees the lower prices at the shelf, but the manufacturer may be the one absorbing the cost.
Tariffs made that imbalance even harder to ignore. Consumers don’t see who absorbed the cost increase, who negotiated it, or who gave something back. They see only one thing: the price they’re being charged at the checkout.
There’s a B2B trust problem buried in that.
Prices Rise Quickly But Lower Slowly
The 2022 standoff between Kraft Heinz and Kroger is a pretty good real-world example of a relationship that went off the rails. Kraft Heinz pushed for higher prices on staples like Jell-O and Kool-Aid to offset rising input costs. Kroger pushed back and, for a time stopped new orders on some products rather than accept the increases.
It was an ugly, very public negotiation. The standoff eventually ended, but the bigger lesson is what happens before it gets to this moment.
Constant communication. Joint business planning. Trading variables like payment terms rather than making every conversation about price. Knowing your costs cold and, critically, having a plan for what happens if the economics change again. These are the non-negotiables for successful B2B relationships.
And most importantly, don’t wait for the retailer to ask before you offer lower pricing, if your material costs come down. That’s where real trust gets built. Show good faith when times are good and it’s easier to negotiate when economies get tough.
THE TAKEAWAY:
Pricing isn’t really about winning the negotiation. It’s about building a business model that both sides can sustainably live with.
Weekly review of retail tech, after the pilot.
Newsletter – TECH IN THE WILD
Electronic Shelf Labels vs Consumer Privacy
I’ve been looking forward to testing Kroger’s KroGo smart cart for some time. The program, by now in over 1,000 stores, has officially moved well past pilot stage.
KroGO Smart Cart in a Kroger Store
How It Works
You place your own shopping bags in the cart. A built-in weight scale and camera scan each item as it goes into your bag. A screen mounted on the cart handle tracks your running total. You can pay right at the cart using the screen, via Apple Pay or credit card even. Then wheel your cart right out to the car. I found it intuitive and easy.
Surprisingly, staff say the carts have held up well to weather and daily use over the six months they’ve been in use in the store I visited.
A recent social media audit I conducted showed that, until recently most customers expressed relative satisfaction with the carts, calling them fast and convenient, though that sentiment has begun to shift more recently, but more on that in a minute.
What Staff Say
Employees and managers were more mixed than shoppers in their reactions. When the carts were initially installed the supplier, Caper, was quick to express that the intent was “not to cut headcount, but to redeploy cashiers to other roles”.
“worked just fine for everyone,” “people really seem to like them.”
Kroger store Assistant Manager
The problem, however, is that Kroger’s workforce, unrelated to Caper, has shrunk by ~65,000 over the past four years, meaning staff in stores routinely struggle to manage cart fleets, recharging, app trouble shooting and loss prevention on top of everything else. They have nothing against KroGO carts, but do feel the weight of tending the carts on their shoulders. So while the carts themselves are testing well, staff are increasingly feeling stretched thin.
Still False Positives
So far Kroger hasn’t reported any cases of their KroGO carts themselves being stolen, like regular shopping carts often are. The carts have a pretty serious anti-theft locking mechanism. So serious that it has a history of false alarms. I spoke to one shopper who had experienced it herself recently. Her KroGO cart locked up at the store exit despite being paid in full. She had to wait for security to come over and rescan her items. She still doesn’t know what triggered it. Reddit forums claim checking out too fast, or large un-bagged items like detergent can trigger the alarm.
The Specter of ESL Regulation
Another murmur I heard from some customers I interviewed in the store quite took me by surprise. Smart cart technology is beginning to be painted with the same skepticism as Electronic Shelf Labels (ESL), and being eyeballed on suspicion of surge-pricing.
Retailers MUST take charge of the narrative around ESL before unions and political grandstanding regulate ESLs into oblivion, or place them beyond customer trust. And this is critical, because how they view ESL is quickly becoming how they view smart cart technology, fair or not.
THE TAKEAWAY:
KroGO technology is working. The real threat to its success is in letting the trust deficit from ESL/surge pricing controversy bleed onto every piece of in-store tech it deploys, smart carts included.
Bi-Weekly Segment Featuring Store Walks And Field Interviews
On The Road
Marshalls
We visited two Marshalls locations, one in NYC, the other in Atlanta and saw two sides of a retailer that is clearly trying to evolve its customer experience.
NYC
The Manhattan location was a standout: incredibly clean and well organized, with strong signage, clear wayfinding, well-presented beauty and clearance depts. and hand baskets placed throughout the store, not just at the entry (be still my heart).
The checkout experience was fast, organized and made the customer feel at ease. The large and colorful digital screen at the store entrance set the stage for a surprisingly upscale feeling experience in a value priced retailer.
ATL
The Atlanta location showed some equally smart merchandising touches, like the seasonal display at the entrance (back to school currently) and furniture merchandised, not just artfully, but placed so you could actually try it out.
“…staff are nice and helpful” … “a great selection of items”
Marshalls Shopper, July 2026
The beauty dept., however, crossed the line from “treasure hunt” to frustration, with too much clutter to sort through, poorly organized high-value products, and no convenient access to mirrors for accessories like hats and scarves that demand a viewing before buying.
Store signage showed fun messaging, but extremely poor physical scale and positioning in the store. What’s the point of having a great sign if it’s too small, and hung too high for anyone to see?
The Opportunity
Marshalls has shown that they have the skills to create great in-store experiences in limited locations and departments. Now they need to work on expanding those skills consistently storewide, and across more locations.
Overall, we came away impressed with Marshalls, and increasingly convinced that it’s more than a traditional value retailer. It’s still a discovery-driven “treasure hunt” destination, but with increasingly sophisticated signage, digital screens and a thoughtful checkout experience. The opportunity now is to bring more consistency to the execution and consider taking the next step technologically, particularly with electronic shelf labels in categories where pricing and merchandising for larger but consistent higher value items, like hair styling tools or shoes, change frequently.
THE TAKEAWAY:
Marshalls has already solved the harder issue of proving a value retailer can support a premium, tech-forward experience. It just hasn’t figured out how to scale it.
