Take a Tour of the Moby Mobile C-Store
By Jackson Lewis on Jun. 23, 2017SHANGHAI -- Watching the promo video for the Moby Mart convenience store is like watching the trailer for the new “Blade Runner” movie, except this could be real.
The prospect of online grocery shopping sounds convenient, however plenty of consumers are skeptical about buying groceries that they haven’t handled themselves.
But what if consumers could have the best of both worlds? What if we could order produce online and then, minutes later, watch a mobile c-store roll up to our front door with produce and packages ready to be perused?
It sounds like science fiction but the technology exists, and the Moby Mart is being tested in Shanghai to see how customers take to a mobile c-store.
Click through for a tour of the rolling c-store from Sweden-based Wheelys and what it could mean for the retail market of tomorrow …
Call a Moby
Users can download an app onto their mobile device to find the Moby Mart nearest them. Once the nearest unit has been found, users can summon it at the touch of a button. Think of it as ordering an Uber or Lyft, except it’s a store instead of a ride.
Open sesame
Each Moby sports an outside module between the entrance and exit doors. The module can be equipped with anything from an ATM or a pharmacy to a coffee machine. It can also house a defibulator or a stock of drugs for emergency situations.
The roof of each Moby houses solar panels to help power the electric engine. Future models will have four drones latched to the roof for automated package delivery, furthering Moby’s reach. There’s also a huge screen on the back of the mobile unit for advertisements.
Customers can open the entrance door with a flick of their phone.
Hol, not Hal
Until self-driving technology advances and laws governing motorized vehicles loosen up, these mobile c-stores are currently either driven in-unit or controlled remotely by a person, but the stores are not designed to transport any human staff.
Instead, the store is “manned” by a holographic store assistant named Hol. Hopefully he’s nothing like the diabolical space assistant Hal 9000 from “2001: A Space Odyssey.”
Anyone who uses Moby Mart has to sign up online and become a member. The app tracks what customers buy, so Hol knows the shopping habits of his customers and can suggest customized offers.
In the future, Moby hopes Hol will be able to act as a sort of butler who can help customers plan dinner recipes, follow a budget and order products online.
Rolling everything store
To purchase items, customers scan the barcodes on items with their phones and check out once their done.
Moby plans to store information about different markets in the cloud to cater to different tastes in different areas. The system combines existing data on customer behaviors with knowledge about individual customers based on their past purchases to decide what to feature for each visitor.
The video for the store shows a wide variety of items available, including produce, packaged food, magazines, headphones and shoes. To restock, the rolling stores can either travel to central warehouses in their area or meet another store and swap supplies.
The theft question
The big question about the concept, beyond the technical hurdles, is security. It’s easy to imagine a criminal waiting until a customer opens the door to slip in, grab as much merchandise as they can and slip out.
Moby’s website briefly addresses security saying, “Since all customers must be members, we almost eliminate theft. You don’t steal the TV at your Airbnb.” While that logic holds true for customers, it doesn’t account for bystanders, especially since this is a 24-hour concept that can go just about anywhere.
Future plans
The concept could work both in urban and rural markets, and its developers designed it that way.
“I grew up in the countryside in Northern Sweden,” Wheelys co-founder Tomas Mazetti told Fast Company. “The last store closed there in the 1980s sometime, and after that, everyone just commuted into the city, but that takes an hour. A little piece of the village died. Now, suddenly, in a place like that, the village can team up and buy one of these stores. If the village is really small, [the store] can move around to different villages.”
Fast Company reports that Wheelys plans to produce and sell the stores by 2018. “I want these to be bought by families or groups of people, so that it’s not one person that owns every store in the world,” said Mazetti. “Instead of working at a warehouse for Amazon, you can own your own little store.”