Hello and welcome to March: In Review

Easter has come and gone. People are looking forward to the summer; not only due to the warmer weather, but also the easing of COVID restrictions. Over a year has passed since the word ‘lockdown’ made an appearance in news headlines, and while retailers have spent this time implementing the latest devices and applications for touchless retail, researchers are beginning to see a change in consumer behavior. With consumers being more health-conscious and time-demanding than ever before, retailers now understand that store design should be their highest priority, optimizing every step of the checkout process.

Adding Buy Online Puck Up At Curbside (BOPAC), Buy Online Pick Up at Store (BOPIS), self-checkout kiosks, mobile apps, mobile tablet POS devices and more puts a lot of pressure on the IT store infrastructure, particularly when so many retailers are adding workarounds on legacy infrastructure. Could this race mean unplanned downtime becomes even more costly in a post-COVID world?