

Korea’s Tesco reinvents grocery shopping with QR-code “stores”  - mattraibert
http://www.geek.com/articles/mobile/koreas-tesco-reinvents-grocery-shopping-with-qr-code-stores-20110628/

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ig1
Tesco (which is actually a British chain that operates in Korea rather than a
Korean chain) has been leading online grocery shopping for a long time. It
first offered Videotex Teleshopping in 1984 and was the first to offer
internet shopping in 1996.

It's online store Tesco.com is the largest online grocery store in the world
(largely driven by the fact that online grocery shopping is much more
mainstream in the UK compared to most other markets)

They're trialling a lot of interesting tech at the moment (API, in-store GPS
for finding products, etc.). One of their major competitors Ocado makes 10% of
their income through iPhone "scan-and-shop" orders so it's definitely a huge
market.

~~~
gmac
Having just placed my fortnightly shop using Ocado's excellent iPad app, I
think wandering round the kitchen/bathroom to check what I still have during
the process of buying new stuff is the most compelling use for the iPad I've
yet found.

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cliff
This is FAKE!

[http://english.hani.co.kr/arti/english_edition/e_business/48...](http://english.hani.co.kr/arti/english_edition/e_business/489884.html)
[updated with English article]

But it's a really cool, fun idea :) grocery shopping while waiting for the
subway. It's one of the coolest concepts for a subway ad I've seen.

~~~
exit
can you tl;dr the article?

i gave up on making sense of the translation when it mentions "'K (K) -9'
self-propelled artillery".

~~~
cliff
Actually, that translation was accurate. :)

I found an English version of this article at
[http://english.hani.co.kr/arti/english_edition/e_business/48...](http://english.hani.co.kr/arti/english_edition/e_business/489884.html)

Basically, they put up this ad in a subway for a couple hours at night, filmed
it, and then took it down.

~~~
espressodude
All the while, I thought this was true! I didn't know this was fake. But, I
agree. This is a very very awesome idea. I would want to have something like
this near here. It really fits my lifestyle.

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luckyisgood
A more advanced version would look like this: Tesco would install digital
walls/displays all over the city (country) and control all the displays
remotely. The city would earn nice money from renting the display space to
Tesco.

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bane
Perhaps one of the best ideas I've ever seen in action. A much better
"browsing" (in the shopping sense of browsing) experience than just flipping
through a list of items on your phone.

The best part is that it gets delivered to your home. So you can literally
shop while waiting for the next train, and there's a good chance the groceries
will arrive not too long after you get home.

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S4M
I don't see why they need to use the trick with the walls at all. Why can't
the consumers do online shopping from their smartphones directly?

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poutine
Much of the shopping experience could be replicated online if people used
large enough photos. The postage stamp sized photos that many sites use are
really stupid. So if you're building an online shopping site give me big juicy
full screen photos.

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jasonjei
I think it would be a real cool concept if I could upload my list ahead of
time or have my groceries retrieved from a conveyer belt at the market that's
automatically retrieved similar to how Amazon's automated distribution systems
work. Of course, I'm sure it wouldn't be cheap or practical for actual use.

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softbuilder
1\. Very tired of seeing this float around. I expect more from HN. (Here come
the downvotes. So be it.)

2\. This is a terrible, terrible idea. If you've got a smartphone, you'd just
shop online. Maybe while you're riding the train.

3\. It's fake? That would make so much more sense.

~~~
chrischen
> 2\. This is a terrible, terrible idea. If you've got a smartphone, you'd
> just shop online. Maybe while you're riding the train.

Well not really. The billboards serve as advertisements, that you just happent
to also be able to shop from.

~~~
softbuilder
I can't remember the last billboard I saw that required me to bend down to
look at it.

~~~
electromagnetic
You bend down to recognize a product near waist height? My friend, you need
glasses.

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TamDenholm
I'm assuming Koreans have a technology friendly subway since doing this on the
London Underground wouldnt really work since you dont get a signal, nor is
there wifi or anything.

~~~
pwim
Yes, there is signal on the subways in Korea.

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wooptoo
I like how they respect their competition, unlike in the software world where
everybody is throwing rotten eggs at everybody.

~~~
Groxx
I think you might be blindly giving them credit that isn't due.
<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2857088>

tl;dr: the ad won them $400k in a competition, though it was never aired, and
the setup existed for only 2 1/2 hours. Despite that:

> _The Cannes Lions festival, called the Olympics of advertising, strictly
> limits submissions to advertisements that have actually been run in the
> media._

I don't _quite_ think that's respecting their competition.

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neovive
I wonder if there is a comparison between this form of online shopping vs.
traditional online shopping via Freshdirect. Perhaps, the visual experience
makes it more appealing and gives it the feel of real shopping as opposed to
using a text search or link clicking.

~~~
hugh3
While I've never used Freshdirect, I can't imagine it's quite as fast and easy
to browse products there as it is to just visually scan across a huge wall of
products. That's the advantage for the consumer.

The advantages are bigger for the seller. You don't have to rely on people
remembering "Oh yes, I need to do some shopping" and going to your website.
Instead they'll be walking through the subway station, remember "Oh yes, I
need kim chee" and buy some. It's as good as having a store in the subway
station, except that the store takes up no room and costs way less.

I can really see this store-on-a-wall thing taking off, and not just in Korea.
If you can be the middleman who standardizes the protocol which lets _anyone_
buy _anything_ and get it delivered to their home, just by scanning a QR code,
you'll make a lot of money.

~~~
dpapathanasiou
" _You don't have to rely on people remembering 'Oh yes, I need to do some
shopping' and going to your website._ "

In that sense, the wall scanning is a bit of a gimmick; the critical thing is
to remember you want/need to buy something.

FreshDirect, for example, _does_ have an iphone app, but without the visual
reminder, you may forget to order.

" _If you can be the middleman who standardizes the protocol which lets anyone
buy anything and get it delivered to their home, just by scanning a QR code,
you'll make a lot of money._ "

That's an interesting idea: tie a QR reader app to someone's credit card or
banks account on one end, and to an automated shopping cart on the other
(assuming the QR links back to a specific product, of course).

~~~
JonWood
_In that sense, the wall scanning is a bit of a gimmick; the critical thing is
to remember you want/need to buy something._

This is the big thing. I work for an online grocery shopping startup, and when
speaking to lapsed customers the biggest answer we get as to why they've
stopped shopping with us is that they forgot we exist and went to the
supermarket instead. Breaking people's habits is a hugely difficult thing, but
vital in a sector where most people's first thought is to go to drop into
Tesco on the way home from work.

