Undated
Instacart acquired Caper, a company that makes a smart shopping cart.
“Caper was an acquisition we made a number of years ago, and it's a smart shopping cart.”
Topic
Caper
14 facts from 1 episode, in date order. These are what speakers said on the shows, each linked to the moment it was said. They aren't independently verified.
Undated
The Caper cart has a digital screen, camera sensors, a basket that works as a scale, and location sensors.
“with a digital screen, camera sensors, the entire basket's a scale so you can weigh produce in the scale, location sensors, so the cart knows where it's at”
Undated
David McIntosh said Caper carts were live in more than one hundred cities.
“we're now, for context, live in more than one hundred cities.”
Undated
Caper carts charge when pushed into each other or into a charger, whereas McIntosh says the industry previously relied on manually plugging in carts.
“as you push the carts into each other or to a charger, they just charge. Sounds obvious, uh, you know, in hindsight, but before us, the industry was really based around manually plugging in carts”
Undated
David McIntosh said retailer A/B studies consistently found significant, in some cases double-digit percentage, increases in consumer spend with Caper carts.
“consistently, what they're finding is there's significant, in some cases, double-digit percentage increases in consumer spend using the Caper carts.”
Undated
Caper added a 'Did you forget?' screen shown to shoppers as they approach checkout.
“we launched a capability where as a user was approaching checkout, we surface a screen that says, Did you forget?”
Undated
David McIntosh said the 'Did you forget?' feature alone produced an incremental 0.9% increase in spend.
“And so that one feature alone drove an incremental 0.9% spend.”
Undated
David McIntosh said the running total is popular because most Americans shop on a budget and do not want to be over budget at the checkout line.
“the vast majority of Americans are shopping on a specific budget. And nobody wants to get to the line, realize they're over budget and have to put something back.”
Undated
Instacart let store staff perform checkout verifications on the cart instead of on a tablet, a change McIntosh called important.
“giving staff the option of conducting those verifications on cart versus on the tablet, that slight tooling change, that slight tooling tweak”
Undated
Instacart built the Caper cart to process AI on the device because many stores have large gaps in Wi-Fi coverage.
“And so we had to build the cart to really deal with these big gaps in Wi-Fi throughout the store, which means a lot of these intelligent systems need to be on device at the edge.”
Undated
David McIntosh said Caper's cameras are focused on recognizing products going into and out of the cart.
“The cameras are focused solely on recognizing products, right? And what's going into the cart, what you're taking out of the cart.”
Undated
Caper's side-facing cameras look at store shelves to help retailers see what is in stock.
“the side-facing cameras are focused on the shelf and helping retailers understand what's in stock, what's out of stock.”
Undated
David McIntosh said Caper's gamification features were inspired by a store walk with Neil Stern of Good Food Holdings.
“our gamification experiences were actually inspired by a store walk with a grocer. This was a partner of ours, CEO of of Good Food Holdings, Neil Stern.”
Undated
Good Food Holdings executives described hiding plastic ladybugs in stores for children to find, which inspired Caper's gamification features.
“they would put plastic ladybugs throughout the store, and they would let kids find the ladybugs.”
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