Amazon has just confirmed the closure of 8 Amazon Go stores in the United States. These new kinds of shops allowed customers to do their shopping independently, without having to go through a checkout.
Remember, in 2018, the world leader in e-commerce Amazon created a surprise by launching a new kind of sales spaces: Amazon Go. These shops are nothing like a classic convenience store, since they don’t have cash registers.
The principle is as follows: customers scan their smartphone on terminals located at the entrance to the store. Their means of payment is then recorded. Then they just have to do their shopping. Every Amazon Go is equipped with an armada of sensors and cameras who film and list items taken by customers.
Once his purchases are finished, the customer only has to leave the establishment, before to be debited automatically. In recent years, Amazon has refined the Amazon Go formula, including testing payment by fingerprint in 2021.
But as you may know, Amazon has been going through a complicated period for the past few months. After losing no less than 1000 billion dollars on the stock market in November 2022, the American giant has confirmed the layoff of more than 10,000 employees. And in this context of crisis, Amazon Go stores are not going to be spared.
8 Amazon Go stores are closing in the United States
Because, Amazon has just confirmed the closure of eight Amazon Go stores in the United States, including two in Seattle for security reasons. This is the company’s latest measure to reduce some of its physical retail activities. “Like any brick-and-mortar retailer, we periodically evaluate our store portfolio and make optimization decisions along the way,” an Amazon spokesperson said in a statement.
In January 2023, current Amazon CEO Andy Jassy announced that Amazon Stores, the group’s retail division, would be affected by this massive restructuring plan. This shutdown for certain Amazon Go stores (about twenty are still open in the USA) comes just a year later. the closure of 68 physical stores of the company, among the Amazon 4 Stars, Books and Pop Up brands.
Source: Geekwire