Amazon is opening its potentially revolutionary checkout-free grocery store to the public today

(Image credit: David Ryder/Getty Images)

last updated 22 January 2018

On Monday, residents of Seattle will have the chance to shop at Amazon Go, the online retail giant's brick-and-mortar grocery store, becoming the first people outside Amazon to try out the cashier-free shopping. Amazon employees started using the convenience store in December 2016, and mastering the technology of using cameras and sensors to charge people the correct amount for their purchase proved harder than expected. Issues included differentiating shoppers with similar body types and dealing with children eating items in-store or rearranging them on shelves, Reuters reports.

Shoppers pass through a turnstile to get into the store, scanning a smartphone app that links them to a credit card on file. Cameras and weight sensors on shelves determine what customers buy, and they are charged for whatever they still have with them when they walk out through the turnstiles again. Reuters correspondent Jeffrey Dastin tried out the store, and he got in an out with a bottle of water in under 30 seconds.

Since customers like speed, Amazon's checkout-free technology could upend retail stores more than its online store already has. But the company says it has no plans to introduce this technology to Whole Foods Market stores, which are bigger and more complicated than Amazon Go shops; Amazon purchased Whole Foods last year for $13.7 billion.

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Peter has worked as a news and culture writer and editor at The Week since the site's launch in 2008. He covers politics, world affairs, religion and cultural currents. His journalism career began as a copy editor at a financial newswire and has included editorial positions at The New York Times Magazine, Facts on File, and Oregon State University.