S1 Ep 2
RFID Retail Use Cases are diversifying beyond a simple 'count' mechanic.
Colin Peacock and Professor Adrian Beck discuss some of the latest thinking from retailers who are seeing significant benefits from the data associated with RFID.
From fitting rooms to inventory accuracy and product returns. And more
Podcast summary
RFID retail use cases are moving beyond basic inventory counting, with retailers sharing practical examples of where RFID can add value in-store and across operations.
Colin Peacock and Professor Adrian Beck discuss a shopper-facing deployment using smart fitting rooms, including how tag data can reveal sizing issues, support upselling, and improve store manager visibility of fitting room activity.
They also reflect on growing momentum in RFID investment, alongside the complexity of using RFID in busy supply chain environments.
Cleaned transcript
RFID Retail Use Cases beyond inventory counting
COLIN:
Hey, look, what was it? January the 24th, we had our meeting of the product ID team, a really big bunch of people, I think 40-odd people, 30-odd retailers.
And we were looking to explore new use cases for RFID in retail.
I think we’ve documented now the sort of inventory counting use case, you know, better accuracy, less cost, more frequent counts, better visibility to what goes missing, handheld readers.
But we were looking to sort of say, well, what’s next? What’s coming beyond that?
And we had one retailer present a really great case of sort of a shopper-facing, if you like, use case.
And then we heard from other retailers on the call providing updates on how they’re using it in the supply chain. And in fact, just their overall deployments.
Fascinating meeting. But what were your notes?
ADRIAN:
Yeah, it was, wasn’t it?
It’s interesting how we’ve been looking at RFID now for nearly 25 years now. It’s been on our radar, hasn’t it, in terms of a technology to be used in retail environments.
And one of those recurring themes across those many years is how are people actually going to use the technology away from those core elements that you mentioned?
One that really has come up over many, many years is smart fitting rooms and smart mirrors.
And I sort of flippantly describe them as the flying cars of RFID, you know, these things that have often been promised but nobody’s really actually got them to work because the ROI has been always been difficult, hasn’t it, with these things.
And yet what was really interesting about the presentation was, you know, here we had a retailer who’d invested in these but actually seemed to be getting some really good payback out of these.
Critically, it’s the information that they can get from the tags going into those spaces and the way that the consumer are interacting with the product. Fascinating.
And so they were getting a lot of payback in terms of just the richness of the data that’s coming from what consumers were taking into those spaces.
But critically, you know, they were getting stuff that was really helpful to the buyers around, well, was the sizing working?
Were people who were taking in a size 10 always having to go back and get a size 12 because it was never the right size?
So they’re getting lots of interesting feedback around that.
But also, you know, we’re hearing how they were using it to try and, you know, upsell as well in terms of saying, well, you’ve taken that product in—how about, you know, can we recommend that you take this product in as well?
So it’s one of the, I think, the first cases where, you know, a retailer was making a really powerful and persuasive case that through using these smart fitting rooms and obviously the data they were making quite a difference.
So it was really encouraging to hear.
RFID Retail Use Cases in smart fitting rooms
COLIN:
Yeah.
What I liked about the information and sort of was a further build on what your points were was that for the store manager they get a real sense of how many people are going into that changing room.
And of course I think there’s a sort of inbuilt belief that if you can get someone into the changing room not only do you stand up at a chance of converting them, but of course they’re returns—you know, in a retail store, even for a physical retail store, could be 10 percent of stuff coming back because it didn’t fit.
We know online it’s like more like 30 or 40 percent.
So I think there’s a sort of real benefit from store manager information as well.
But yeah, it was interesting as well to hear the other retailers’ reactions and what the other retailers were up to.
ADRIAN:
Yeah, it was.
I think, you know, I came away with, you know, we’ve always—we’ve on this long journey, I think, of people adopting RFID.
And it has been a long journey, you know, and I think companies are feeling their way now.
But I got a real sense from that, that just now the volume of companies that are now looking at and beginning to invest in RFID feels like it’s a real momentum.
And so we heard from, you know, quite a lot of retailers on the call who were, you know, pretty much investing for the core reasons that we’ve mentioned around on-shelf availability and stock accuracy and all these things.
But what we’re also seeing is, as these companies bed into that return on investment model, they’re now beginning to creep out in terms of using it for other things.
Not only, you know, that we heard around the sort of the smart fitting rooms, but we also heard stories, didn’t we, about people beginning to go back down the supply chain, using it in their distribution centres to get more visibility there.
And of course, it’s got a real potential around online as well in terms of, you know, making sure that that visibility can feed through into customers ordering stock online and making sure it’s available.
And then, you know, I think we’re also going to see how people are using it in terms of managing returns as well.
So, you know, it’s really good to see this growth in investment in the technology, people beginning to get value from it, and then beginning to expand their business case as they become comfortable with the core reasons for the investment in the first place.
RFID Retail Use Cases in supply chains and distribution centres
COLIN:
Yeah, no, it was fascinating and we heard also some of the things around the complexity.
If you’re shipping RFID goods from a fulfilment centre to a store for pickup, you know, make sure it doesn’t go onto the store’s inventory—you’ve got to figure out how to do that.
We’re still talking about shielding and making sure you’re not reading stuff.
We’ve got all the good old issues still keep on popping up which I think explains why this working group carries on.
And we’ve got some real cool members of this from around the world, you know, who really do sort of give some valuable input to others and to themselves.
ADRIAN:
Yes, yeah.
I think, you know, it’s interesting—one of them where they were trying out using RFID in their supply chain, just trying to, you know, use it to try and monitor stock moving at the docks for instance and moving on to the trucks.
And it was really, you know, insightful just the challenges of getting that technology to work in such busy, complicated, highly challenging spaces for RFID use cases in retail.
And they, you know, they were trying to get it to work but, you know, they walked away at this moment because it’s just too complicated, too difficult.
And, you know, I think one of the dangers in those very complex environments where you’re asking a lot of the tags and the tag readers in particular is you need to weigh up, don’t you, which is how much to invest in trying to make sure it works properly versus getting on with other things.
You know, it’s got to provide value in and of itself.
And if you’re spending more time just trying to make sure it’s done the right thing—that is, the data actually accurate from RFID—then perhaps you need to step away and say, you know, is this the right time for us to be using this to try and solve this particular problem?
And I think for that retailer, they sort of said, it’s not actually solving the problem we want at this time using this approach.
What the working group will explore next
COLIN:
And so that was also very refreshing as well.
Yeah, it’s certainly not a sort of launch and leave technology, is it? It’s a launch and, you know, manage with a lot of care and attention and don’t mess it up.
We’ve got, I think, we’ve got three or four more meetings coming up in the towards the end of this year.
We’re going to look at product identification, we’ve got to look at more technologies, maybe even your green tooth idea.
But we also look at RFID in grocery and also supply chains.
We’ve got some pretty inspiring use cases out there for the supply chain from Chipotle who are using it to help manage food safety, but also UPS are looking at the supply chain.
So hope to hear from some speakers from those particular organisations.
And then we should be heading to Barcelona in October and enjoying a sort of in-person meeting just again exploring—would be based in a distribution centre—so that’ll be a lot of fun as well.
So thank you very much indeed and we’ll certainly see the next one which is on grocery and RFID in grocery which we’ve heard people talk about.
So thank you. Cheers. Bye bye
