Hacker Remix

Walgreens replaced fridge doors with smart screens. It's now a $200M fiasco

81 points by zinekeller 3 days ago | 97 comments

hooli_gan 3 days ago

burkaman 3 days ago

So happy this is failing, it looked like an absolute nightmare from the videos I saw. Endless ads, waste of energy, waste of time and effort, just a disaster.

cosmotic 3 days ago

Screens had white background, and actual shelves were black with little light. They also appeared 'full' even when the shelves behind them were bare. Open the door and you're hit with a huge wave of shock and disappointment, much worse than if you just saw the empty, dark shelf without the screen because you're hopes were never raised.

duxup 3 days ago

> As part of a 10-year contract with Walgreens for a split of the ad revenue, Cooler Screens had installed 10,000 smart doors at hundreds of US locations like this one. It planned to install 35,000 more

Why not do a smaller test run to gauge response?

I question the ability for anyone who oked this to make basic decisions…

DwnVoteHoneyPot 3 days ago

The article says "He and Wasson say that based on their PowerPoint presentation, the company approved a six-store pilot program for 2018. Pilot data showed the screens resulting in more than a 5% incremental sales jump, and Walgreens committed to installing them in an additional 50 stores the next year as part of a decade-long deal. In late 2020, after Walgreens agreed to add another 2,450"

covercash 3 days ago

The Cooler Screens CEO sounds like a “fake it till you make it at all costs” kind of guy just based on the allegations of fraud at his tea company and his conspiracy allegations at the Four Seasons interview. I’d be very wary of any data provided by his company indicating increased sales, it’s very easy to manipulate the excel data if nobody is verifying how the data was collected in the first place.

kevinventullo 3 days ago

But shouldn’t increased sales numbers be something Walgreens measures? On the other hand, this was probably some mid-level exec’s chance at growing in the company, so maybe there was some internal incentive to massage the numbers (e.g. maybe 5% is much smaller than the per-store standard deviation).

I dunno, just guessing.

yorwba 3 days ago

The article mentions

"[Cooler Screens CEO] Avakian [...] says [Walgreens] turned off its access to point-of-sale data for products outside the cold section, which brands like Revlon needed to confirm lipstick ads on fridges really were enticing shoppers to walk over to the beauty aisle."

tessierashpool9 3 days ago

> Pilot data showed the screens resulting in more than a 5% incremental sales jump

because it's a novelty and draws attention. soon afterwards replaced with annoyance about this total nonsense.

rcarmo 3 days ago

In corporate speak, this was a major sales win for that startup, and I don’t think they would have gone this far without a lot of people at Walgreens buying into the concept.

Which makes me think there is a major disconnect between those people and Walgreens customers—I mean, it’s obvious that people who like shopping like to browse, and that they also like to have the least possible amount of stuff between them and what they are looking for.

So completely breaking that experience (and often having people open doors that had no product behind them) is probably frustrating enough for those people to shop elsewhere, or to simply avoid those aisles and shop less.

Genius move, if you want to lose customers.

csours 3 days ago

FOMO? Perhaps they were offered exclusivity?

Also, it's a brand new income stream. Managers love to talk about income streams at shareholder meetings.

canucker2016 3 days ago

FTA: "Avakian co-founded the startup with former Walgreens CEO Greg Wasson, who helped secure the deal with his old employer."

The article also mentions that, under Wasson, Walgreens invested millions in Theranos.

Great track record there.

jazzyjackson 3 days ago

Wild that they thought there was any reason to advertise pizza rolls to me when I'm already at the shelf where pizza rolls are sold.

minimaxir 3 days ago

It's the same logic of Amazon showing you similar items to you items you already purchased. Atleast pizza rolls can be repeatedly purchased, unlike Amazon which advertises hot tubs after you bought a hot tub.

darth_avocado 3 days ago

It’s the same logic where every single online space (Amazon, Instagram, Facebook, Google) kept showing me latest and best toilets for 3 months straight after I bought a new toilet on my credit card, as if I was some toilet connoisseur.

Arnt 3 days ago

Or a landlord with two dozen apartments.

dowager_dan99 3 days ago

should have just gone to Costco and bought the vacu-sealed 12-pack of toilets!

quesera 3 days ago

Amazon shows you previously purchased products in case you're considering a return. They want you to buy your next choice from them too. It's nuts to imagine that Amazon hasn't done the math here.

Pizza rolls, on the other hand, might not be the thing you were planning to buy when you paused in front of the display case, or even just walked by. The intent is to drive impulse purchases. Plus there's ad revenue there obviously.

smitelli 3 days ago

I bought a hub nut for a washing machine from Amazon once (don't judge, it was an emergency situation and next-day shipping factored heavily into the choice). Years later, they are still suggesting repair components for appliance models I do not even own.

Maybe it thinks I'm an appliance repair shop or something. Heck, maybe I should lean into it and make it a side hustle.

quesera 3 days ago

I'd guess that's a similar-customers profile.

Most people don't buy hub nuts. Those that do, often also buy wash cycle timer assemblies.

But yeah, I don't think an Amazon ad will be the driver for that kind of purchase. Though I suppose it serves as a reminder that you could start your next parts search at Amazon instead of geapplianceparts dot com.

Kon-Peki 3 days ago

> It's nuts to imagine that Amazon hasn't done the math here.

Amazon has definitely done the math and determined that the brands that buy advertising on their platform have really dumb ideas about how much they should bid for the advertising slots.

Actually, that’s pretty uncharitable. I doubt that Amazon gives the brands enough information to know whether the eyeballs they are bidding for are about to purchase an item in category X or just recently purchased an item in category X.

wink 2 days ago

They should have done the math just how often you buy a vacuum or a fridge though, because I observed the inverse effect. Buy vacuum -> 6 months of suggestions for vacuums and then nothing, not the other way round.

xboxnolifes 3 days ago

> It's nuts to imagine that Amazon hasn't done the math here.

The same could be said about Walgreens, and yet here we are.

dowager_dan99 3 days ago

YT does this too; how often do I need to learn how to replace the belt in a 27 year old Kenmore dryer? Analytics probably loves how closely aligned a viewed video is with recommendations, but it's useless.

uj5tr345fqq 3 days ago

even better, the pizza rolls are probably sold out, but you can't see that until you open the case... because of the ad.

reginald78 3 days ago

I wonder if you could stock a knock off with a big markup and then buy the ads for the brand name to dupe customers into overpaying for crap!

hombre_fatal 3 days ago

They remind me of airport flight departure gate screens that show ads (e.g. Mexico City).

You're waiting for an ad to play before you can see the information critical to the reason you're even at this place at all.

ironhaven 3 days ago

I think its more like how if someone searches the name of your business on google and you have to pay for advertising on your own name to prevent a competitor from being placed above your search results.

If someone searches for "al's roof repair" the top results will be sponsored links to other roofing companies who paid for ads before "al's roof repair".