CHICAGO -- “There’s no point only looking to the past to predict the future,” said Oliver Schlake, Ph.D. and clinical professor at the University of Maryland’s Robert H. Smith School of Business.
In a fast-paced, yet informative, hour-long presentation on the second day of the 2017 NACS State of the Industry Summit, Schlake challenged leaders in the convenience-store industry to revisit the way they think about and prepare for the future.
Here are four possibilities Schlake sees for the c-store industry’s future …
“In my world,” Schlake said, “the drone of the future is the pickup drone.” He predicts that delivery drones will launch not from a warehouse or retail store but from the homes of consumers.
He sees a future where homeowners can purchase a drone dock for their home and retailers can purchase corresponding docks for their stores, allowing customers to send their personal drones to stores nearby, pick up their items and return home.
Schlake pointed out that most everyone lives within a mile or two of a c-store, and sending a home-docked drone to a nearby c-store and back could take as little as 2 minutes.
Schlake suggested that smart refrigerators could play an important role in the food-purchase decisions of consumers.
He said smart fridges that can connect to the internet will be able to sense when they’re running low on certain foods. They will then notify the drones docked on the roof to go to a nearby c-store or other distribution center to retrieve the food.
Schlake envisioned a future where automated c-store systems could size up a customer and deliver an advertisement tailor-made for them in “eight seconds or less while you have their attention,” citing predictive analytical tools such as IBM’s Watson and the emergence of artificial intelligence and computer learning.
He said these smart tools could use little details such as bumper stickers, vanity license plates and even the clothes customers wear to decide what type of consumer they are and what they’re likely looking for to generate the best advertisement for their needs.
As the physical post office declines, Schlake said c-stores could pick up the slack. He used Amazon lockers as an example of how c-stores are already starting to fill the role of pickup and delivery center.
He also said that many urban apartment complexes don’t accept packages due to the hassle of securing them, making the service that much more important in cities.
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