Supermarket – a large form of the traditional grocery store, is a self-service shop offering a wide variety of food and household products, organized into aisles.
That’s how wiki defines a supermarket. You can see one pop up suddenly near your house one day, with bright lights and lots of offers displayed at the entrance to lure passers by to walk in.
I’ve always had a love-hate relationship with supermarkets. I love them for the variety they offers under one roof. There is always a choice in a supermarket. I hate them because of long queues I have to stand in, to buy even a pack of cookies. There is never a choice here.
For me, time is the most valuable asset and I’ll do anything to save my precious time being wasted in long queues. I would rather goto a a kirana shop owned by my friendly neighbor, Mrs. Annapoorni, buy what I need, do small talk during the 1 minute it takes to complete the transaction and packaging and walk back home with a smile on my face.
When I took a pledge to try and avoid supermarkets as much as possible, I stumbled upon a video on Facebook. A revolutionary technology, that will totally eliminate queues in supermarkets, that is going to be a game changer in retail industry - Amazon Go.
Immediately, I started dreaming about how I can walk into a supermarket again, pick up what I want, and just leave. Most importantly, I don’t have to stand in queues. But then, the bubble popped. Reality hit me, hard. Such a technology will never come to India anytime soon, and even if it does, the retailers in India cannot afford to support it with the necessary infrastructure and security.
I’ve always considered myself to be very fortunate for the opportunities I’ve had in my life. I’ve had the chance to explore my options and chase after my ambitions with the help of the people around me.
At this point of time, I work with Gofrugal, the market leaders in POS solutions for Retail, Restaurant and Distribution businesses. If I can make my dreams of an alternative to Amazon Go become a reality, it can happen with Gofrugal .
The culture at Gofrugal is such that people are always looking to innovate and experiment, people love to help each other out and work happens fast. Making full use of this, we brainstormed, throwing up and shooting ideas for half a day, and we finally had a winner.
SellSmart – The mobile billing POS app.
Considering the limitations and demographics we have in India, a very careful and through thought have been gone into the conception of SellSmart.
What is SellSmart ?
It’s an app that retailers can use to bill products without the need of a checkout counter and to avoid queues.
How does it work?
SellSmartintegrates with your existing POS software (That’s right. We are not one of those companies that gives good stuff with a string attached) and syncs with your existing data. So basically it acts like your check-out counter, the only difference is that you’ll be billing customers using a smartphone instead of a clunky PC or a touch POS system.
What are the features of SellSmart ?
- Barcode Scanner – Add items to cart instantly by integrating Bluetooth Bar code scanners
- Hold & recall bills – Serve multiple customers at a time by pausing and recalling an incomplete bill
- Reports – Measure service level by measuring detailed report of bills orders,payment with custom date filters
- Instant printing – Print bills on the go with Bluetooth printers or take bill print from current POS printers
- Offline billing – Afraid of network and power issue? No problem, make bills offline and sync it later
- Payment collection – Collect payments through cash or cheque and keep in track of accounts & receivables
What are the advantages to a retailer?
- 80% faster checkouts for customers with less than 10 items in their cart.
- 50% more savings in hardware, accessories, furniture and retail counter space investment
- 2 times the sales – One from your retail outlet and one from stalls, kiosks and mobile booths
- Take orders and deliver, right from your customer’s doorstep.
Is SellSmart the competitor for Amazon Go? Definitely not. SellSmart is a product the bridges the gap between the present day checkout counter and the futuristic Counter-les retail.
We are living in a time where anything is available “Now”. Want to listen to music? Listen to it “Now” on Youtube. Want to see a movie? See it “Now” on Netflix. Want to do talk to your friend who is half way across the globe? Talk “Now” on Skype.
Want to avoid long queues and frustrated customers?
Do it “Now” with SellSmart…or you can wait for another 5 years to finally realize that Amazon Go is not considering the Indian Market.
Here is SellSmart in action when we were developing the app and testing it on various products.
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