Wal-Mart and Target, two of the nation’s highest-profile retailers, are installing self-checkout lanes in stores, a move that can save time for shoppers and cut labor costs for some businesses.
By the end of the year, 3,000 Walmart stores across the country – including a majority in Orange County – will be outfitted with do-it-yourself checkout systems. Target is testing self-checkout in 16 stores across the country including California stores in Valencia, Clovis and San Diego.
Walmart stores also are testing a mobile checkout system. The program, not available in Southern California, enables customers to scan groceries and merchandise using an app on their phone. Customers pay for merchandise at a self-checkout station using a QR code generated by an app.
“It’s about offering our customers a choice when they check out. They are looking for easier ways to shop our stores,” Wal-Mart Stores Inc. spokeswoman Ashley Hardie said.
Over the past several weeks, self-serve cash registers have been installed at Walmart stores in Huntington Beach, Orange, Irvine, San Clemente, Westminster and Foothill Ranch.
With self-serve stations prominent in Southern California supermarkets for years, one industry expert called Wal-Mart’s move long overdue.
“I think Wal-Mart is late in the game,” said supermarket analyst Craig Rosenblum.
Rosenblum, a partner at the Illinois-based Willard Bishop consulting firm, said it is a “logical next step” for big-box retailers to add quick checkout options for time-strapped shoppers.
Roughly 56 percent of consumers use self-checkout when it is available, according to an independent survey conducted for NCR Corp. In that survey, 25 percent of self-checkout users said they would shop at their preferred grocery store less frequently if self-checkout were not an option.
“We are actually seeing a growing appetite around the world to provide better service through the addition of self checkout,” said Dusty Lutz, an executive at NCR, the world’s largest supplier of retail self-checkout technology.
Shopper Kathy Walker said she loves the hassle-free option of Walmart’s new self-serve lanes in Orange. “It’s a very easy process,” said Walker, 64. “We’d like to see self checkout at the 99 Cents store, Dollar Store and Target.”
In Southern California, Ralphs, Vons and Albertsons have offered supermarket customers self-checkout for years. Home Depot also offers self-checkout.
Nationally, reaction to the service is mixed lately.
This year, Jewel-Osco said it would eliminate self-checkout lanes from some of its Midwest stores so it can reconnect with customers. In 2011, Albertsons stores outside of California scrapped self-serve machines for the same reason.
In the highly competitive Southern California market, Albertsons still maintains the most self-serve stations. About 150 of its 192 grocery stores in the region have self-checkout, including some of the chain’s 37 Orange County supermarkets. The company has no plans to change that mix, spokeswoman Christine Wilcox said.
Ralphs and Vons each have 50 stores with self-checkout options from a total of 493 stores. Some retailers are doing nothing but self-checkout. Fresh & Easy stores, sold recently to supermarket magnate Ron Burkle, are equipped exclusively with self-checkout registers.
Critics of self-pay, however, say self-checkout results in poor customer service and lost jobs. For example, a bank of four self-serve machines is typically manned by one cashier.
“It means three people are out of work,” Stater Bros. Chief Executive Jack Brown said.
Hardie said Walmart stores are not eliminating employees. Instead, she said more workers are being deployed elsewhere in the store to help customers.
Rosenblum said improved customer service is not the main motivator for retailers: “Let’s be clear: Self-checkout saves money,” he said. “It is simple math.”
Brown, known as a traditionalist in the supermarket industry, said he’s unwilling to jeopardize jobs and customer service by adding self-checkout registers.
“We unload your cart, we ring up the item correctly and we bag it and help you take it out,” he said. “When a self-checkout can smile and say, ‘Thank you and come back again,’ we’ll consider it.”
Register staff reporter
Kelly Kehoe contributed
to this report.
Contact the writer: nluna@ocregister.com
