Sam’s Club Safeguards Its Associates’ Handhelds
Sam’s Club is rolling out technology to mitigate the costs and hassles of replacing and repairing handheld devices used by its thousands of associates to store data, track merchandise and service customers.
The technology solution is a self-service locker, or kiosk, for safeguarding, charging and monitoring employee handheld devices in warehouses and retail stores, called ARC, or “asset recharge center.”
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“We feel this is a key part of our device strategy and ensures that all associates can quickly and easily access a device,” said Chad Donath, senior vice president of operations for Sam’s Club.
Increasingly, retailers have been issuing handheld devices to provide better service and increase productivity. Typically, workers in distribution centers use handhelds for picking and packing of online orders, and store associates use them for inventory information, price checks, mobile payment processing and accessing information for clienteling. It’s also typical that retailers don’t always anticipate the time and money involved in maintaining or replacing handhelds, whether they’re lost, stolen or broken, and the impact issues with handhelds have on productivity and cybersecurity.
ARC’s mobile device lockers have begun rolling out to Sam’s Clubs and will eventually be in all 600 locations by the end of the year, the companies indicated. According to ARC, the lockers provide “one-to-one device accountability, proprietary charging technology, quick scan-in and scan-out devices and the ability for workers to report problems with devices.
“Our associates are already telling us these lockers allow them to stop worrying about lost or damaged devices and gives them more time to focus on taking care of our member[s],” said Donath.
According to ARC, company-owned devices go missing at a 25 percent rate each year, missing devices open up companies to cyber breaches and 35 percent of devices become nonfunctioning each year.
ARC indicated that its technology is designed to mitigate the hassles and reduce the time involved in how most retailers manage their supply of handheld devices. Devices are typically kept in back rooms where managers waste time overseeing manual sign-in and sign-out processes, though sometimes with high-end stores, associates take home the handhelds to facilitate round-the-clock clienteling.
ARC’s partnership with Sam’s Club “is a clear message that retailers no longer have to struggle with their enterprise mobile devices,” said Douglas Baldasare, founder and chief executive officer of ARC, a division of ChargeItSpot, which provides phone charging stations for brands, retailers and malls. “Sam’s Club associates can now focus on continuing to deliver the absolute best member experience.”
ARC was launched in September 2021. Comoto/Revzilla, an e-commerce business operating distribution centers and the University of Mass Memorial Health Care have also deployed ARC kiosks. The kiosks come in three sizes; the smallest with 24 lockers, a midsize version with 48 lockers and the largest kiosk contains 96 lockers. ChargeItSpot leases the hardware, typically for three to five years, and provides software maintenance, data reporting and connectivity. The stations range in size from 7.5 feet to 15 feet wide, and are all 6 feet tall and 14 inches deep.
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