Retail Tech: Amazon Ends Direct Venmo Payments, Carter’s Taps Shipt for Same-Day Delivery
The weekly Retail Tech Roundup compiles technology news across the supply chain, manufacturing, retail, e-commerce, logistics and fulfillment sectors.
Payments
Amazon/Venmo
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Amazon will discontinue Venmo as a direct payment option on its marketplace starting Jan. 10, just over a year after the e-commerce giant began offering the service at checkout.
Customers can still use their Venmo debit card or credit card to pay on Amazon, but it is no longer possible to add Venmo as an Amazon payment option.
At the time of the initial launch in October 2022, the online retail giant said it wanted to offer customers payment options that were convenient and easy-to-use.
Venmo parent PayPal first reached a deal with Amazon back in 2021, well ahead of the integration’s rollout, that would allow users to pay with Venmo.
Delivery
Carter’s/Shipt
Carter’s, Inc. is partnering with Shipt to power its same-day delivery strategy, having integrated the service ahead of the holiday season.
Consumers can now access all of Carter’s brands from the Shipt Marketplace, in addition to the Carter’s app, for same-day delivery of apparel and other family products. U.S. markets served by Shipt include Atlanta, Chicago, Dallas, Los Angeles, Miami and New York among others, with the delivery network reaching 80 percent of households in the country.
“At Carter’s, we know what it means to be a parent,” said Andrew Tashiro, vice president, store operations at Carter’s. “Sleepless nights, emergency outfit changes, growth spurts, sick days and theme days at school call for a quick fix, which is why we are thrilled to offer same-day delivery through a partnership with Shipt.”
Shipt is owned by Target, powering the mass merchant’s last-mile delivery network nationwide.
JD.com
JD Logistics, the logistics arm of JD.com, has unveiled the launch of its international express delivery service. The new service expands JD.com’s logistics services outside China, a significant step in the company’s broader international market expansion.
Currently available for individuals in the Chinese cities Shenzhen and Guangzhou, the express delivery service will initially cover 23 countries across North America and Europe, facilitating one-way deliveries from China. JD Logistics plans to extend the reach of this service domestically as well, expanding its availability throughout China.
Leveraging the company’s robust express delivery network, customers in China can book doorstep pick-ups through the JD Express feature on WeChat, where JD’s in-house couriers can pick orders up within one hour. JD Express also includes real-time parcel tracking to provide customers with more transparency throughout the delivery process.
JD.com is actively expanding its international supply chain and logistics capabilities. In a strategic collaboration with global parcel delivery service Geopost earlier this year, JD Logistics developed shipping solutions for consumers and businesses between China and Europe. Additionally, the company says is adapting its warehousing model in China to meet industry demands in Europe, North America, the Middle East, Australia and Southeast Asia.
Notably, JD Logistics’ overseas warehousing operations already offer same-day fulfillment services in key European markets, including the U.K., Germany, the Netherlands, France, Spain and Poland, while ensuring two-to-three-day delivery across 90 percent of regions in the U.S.
Livestreaming
Victoria’s Secret/Firework
Victoria’s Secret & Co. has partnered with shoppable livestreaming platform Firework to bring interactive videos to the intimates retailer’s flagship website.
With the initiative, Victoria’s Secret says it can better connect with its e-commerce customers and build out a more engaging, personalized digital retail experience.
The relationship begins with a strategic rollout of video commerce across short, interactive videos, leveraging existing campaigns and social content on Victoria’s Secret online shopping platforms with future plans to continue innovation throughout the customer journey.
In the blog post announcing the partnership, Firework cited data shared by Statista, saying that the global apparel market is set to increase by $200 billion from 2023 to 2027, adding $50 billion each year to $1.94 trillion. If this growth pace continues, the total revenues are forecasted to surpass $2 trillion by 2028, the company said.
“In the competitive online market, standing out is crucial for brands like Victoria’s Secret & Co. Their strategy is to attract and retain consumers by providing an enriched online customer experience that mirrors the personalized interactions customers traditionally expect from brands in-store,” the post said.
Robotics
Spanx/GXO/Agility Robotics
Pure-play contract logistics provider GXO Logistics, Inc. unveiled it is conducting a proof-of-concept pilot for Agility Robotics’ human-centric robot “Digit.” The robot is being tested on logistics tasks at a facility in Flowery Branch, Ga., where GXO manages warehouse operations, direct-to-consumer and in-store orders for the global women’s wear brand Spanx.
Digit—which is 5’9″ tall, weighs 140 pounds and can lift up to 35 pounds—is designed to work in human spaces and can be easily adapted to various warehouse tasks through software updates. The bipedal robot can walk forward, backward, turn around and bend, and can grab, lift and move totes around a warehouse. Amazon is trialing Digit in one of its warehouses near its Seattle headquarters.
Agility Robotics and GXO are teaching Digit to undertake repetitive tasks such as moving totes from autonomous mobile robots (AMRs) and placing them onto conveyors. Reduction of such repetition can reduces strain, increase safety for team members and free them to do more value-added work in the warehouse.
If this initial phase proves successful, it will pave the way for piloting Digit in a wider variety of roles in 2024, GXO says.
GXO and Spanx first unveiled their partnership in March, with the women’s wear brand occupying the logistics provider’s 445,000-square-foot dedicated site. The facility employs nearly 200 people and uses 6 River Systems collaborative robots, or “cobots,” to improve efficiency and to enhance employees’ safety and their overall work experience.
GreyOrange/Hai Robotics
Automated robotic fulfillment and inventory optimization software GreyOrange Inc. and Hai Robotics, a global provider of automated storage and retrieval systems (ASRS), have elevated their strategic partnership, resulting in customer competitive advantages.
Together, after more than two years of partnership, GreyOrange software and Hai Robotics hardware have yielded increased throughput, storage density and agility, resulting in accelerated customer operations and growth.
GreyOrange and Hai Robotics have completed more than 10 projects together, assisting with fulfillment operations including at Walmart, as well as at one of the largest fashion retailers in the world, and many other large-scale retailers across the U.S. and Europe.
The two companies have come together to create an offering for warehouses and distribution centers worldwide. GreyOrange’s fulfillment orchestration platform, GreyMatter, uses its multi-agent orchestration (MAO) capabilities to connect and run both Hai’s tote-to-person autonomous mobile robots (AMRs) and GreyOrange’s rack-to-person AMRs on a single grid. This can unify complex or cross-functional operations throughout a facility for streamlined operations.
Hai Robotics’ ASRS, driven by autonomous case-handling mobile robots (ACR), can offer more flexible storage density for totes, trays, boxes or oversized items within an automated storage system. The company claims that its goods-to-person systems can be constructed using almost any industry standard racking and containers.
Systems can have varying heights up to 10 meters high, and varying container sizes and material, stored up to 5 totes deep.
In addition to simultaneous orchestration of GreyOrange AMRs and Hai Robotics ACRs with GreyMatter, this partnership has resulted in direct picking into on-demand packing boxes, which can eliminating extra touches from picking operations. The strategic partnership has also benefited the automated robotic fulfillment space with a fully integrated micro-fulfillment center solution, which can fulfill orders in less than an hour.
Returns
Coldwater Creek/Soft Surroundings/Newmine
Women’s apparel and home products brands Coldwater Creek and newly acquired Soft Surroundings have both selected returns reduction technology provider Newmine to address product returns opportunities.
The AI-based Chief Returns Officer platform is built to allow the brands to predict, forecast and prevent returns, ultimately with the goal to boost profitability.
Using Chief Returns Officer’s predictive analytics, the Coldwater Creek and Soft Surroundings teams can analyze and take corrective actions on why customers return merchandise, which can deepen the loyalty and trust with their customers and boost customer satisfaction.
“Returns are a major focus for our brands. Newmine’s innovative solution enables our brands to proactively reduce returns leading to greater sales and profitability,” says David Walde, CEO at Coldwater Creek and Soft Surroundings.
Through automated analysis of sales, returns, and customer feedback data to identify the root cause of returns, Chief Returns Officer aims to empower retailers in-season to address upstream issues that cause returns, and save millions in net revenue.
Makip
Fit technology specialist Makip is debuting its Unisize virtual try-on technology in the U.S., in an effort to help consumers better find right-sized items and minimize product returns.
The Japan-based company says it can take as little as one month to integrate Unisize with a client’s website. The technology is built to help online shoppers “try on” clothing online so they can purchase the most suitable, accurately sized clothing item.
According to Makip, Unisize can deliver a reduction in clothing return rates of 20 percent on average.
Makip’s technology asks shoppers basic questions such as age, weight and height to understand the measurements of their body, allowing the sizing technology to map the individual’s body size to the clothing item, and then display how the clothes will fit the unique body size of the shopper.
The fit tech firm cited its own analysis, saying that providing online shoppers with more accurate sizing options increases the decision to purchase by 2.5 times.
E-commerce
Rithum
CommerceHub, a commerce network built to help brands, suppliers and retailers collaborate on delivering connected e-commerce experiences, has rebranded to Rithum.
Rithum, which already acquired companies like e-commerce solutions provider ChannelAdvisor and dropshipping and fulfillment software provider Dsco in recent years, also announced the acquisition of AI-based visual search technology company Cadeera for an undisclosed sum.
All of the standalone software will now be under one roof under the Rithum name.
Rithum’s network—spanning more than 40,000 brands, retailers and suppliers—is constructed to support the entire e-commerce lifecycle. This includes managing product listings, marketing, sales and delivery. This can enable businesses to expand category and product assortment, manage inventory with fluctuating consumer demand, establish dropship or marketplace distribution and integrate digital marketing with listing optimization—all while testing performance to help maximize ROI and investment.
Rithum processes $50 billion in annual gross merchandise value (GMV). Additionally, due to the platform’s reach across more than 420 marketplaces and retail sites, Rithum manages over $500 million in digital marketing and retail media ad spend.
“Leaders from brands and retailers need a partner that is thinking holistically across different partnership models in the connected commerce ecosystem,” said Heather Hershey, research director, worldwide digital commerce at IDC, in a statement. “Rithum aims to fill this gap in the industry and serve as a one-stop shop powering the entire e-commerce shopping journey.”
While Rithum already using AI to better optimize delivery operations, costs and platforms for its customers, the Cadeera acquisition enables Rithum to combine advances in computer vision, language processing and machine learning to power applications including product onboarding, search, and discovery.
E-commerce content
Ekom AI
Ekom AI, a provider of digital storefront content automation, has unveiled its third-generation release, Ekom 3.0. The technology leverages artificial intelligence to automate a brand’s voice at scale across their website, which can help sell more.
The new release includes TruNexus Intelligence, an integration feature that is designed to more accurately score and approve optimized digital storefront content. TruNexus Intelligence offers control and oversight of content accuracy, voice and structure, which can effectively remove many barriers to AI adoption in structured product content creation at scale.
In an analysis of over 140,000 active product description pages, Ekom’s TruNexus Intelligence correctly identified non-conforming content and optimized the cohort at a rate of 99.83 percent accuracy across categories including syntax, structure, brand voice and product specification.
Based on proprietary algorithms and your traffic analytics, Ekom can suggest ways to grow by updating and optimizing your product assets. Partnering with Google, Ekom also is built to ensure product listings are always up-to-date with the latest SEO trends.
Chat
Armani Group/On
Fashion and luxury goods seller, manufacturer and distributor Armani Group has selected chat platform On to power its generative AI-based chat experiences across several brands.
Following On’s successful launch with A|X Armani Exchange in March 2023, the partnership will be extended to Armani Exchange Canada, Armani Exchange UK, Emporio Armani and its sister sportswear brand EA7 Emporio Armani.
In the first six months after implementing the On platform, A|X Armani Exchange says it saw “very positive” results.
Notably, 92 percent of inbound inquiries were immediately addressed through automated AI chat, accelerating the speed to resolution through shopping journeys. Additionally, engagement with On resulted in up to a five times increase in the likelihood of shoppers making purchases, the luxury firm said.
As part of the partnership, Armani Group has become part of On’s “Bounded Expertise” GenAI Beta program.
