Originally Posted to my Medium on June 7th, 2016 -- Original Link Here:

Picture this:

You get out of work, you gotta get home quick to get the kids. Ruby has Dance, and Keanu has Karate. It’s the end of the “Dance” year and you forgot to get Ruby’s dance teacher a gift… looks like you’ll be making a stop at Wegmans.

Wegmans Supermarket

So you briskly walk into the store, hurriedly grab what you seek, and then walk towards the registers expecting long lines and too few attendants moving the lines along… except there are no registers… and there are no lines…

This is where you realize, “I live in the FUTURE!”

Relieved, you wrestle your phone out of your pocket, walk through the doors equipped with anti-theft sensors, and a notification pops up asking you:

Notification Prompt to buy items you’re carrying. By Kelly Reddington using Balsamiq Mockup tool.

You tap “YES” with your thumb as you continue walking, and your payment is processed.

No** Lines. No Waiting. Just Get Your Stuff and Go.**

Wouldn’t you like to see something like this? It’s waaayyyyy easier than standing in line or going through the self-checkout machines.* (And what’s up with those self-checkout lines? The attendant always looks at you like you’re stealing! You can be buying banana’s while wearing a $6,000 Breitling watch and they still eye you up and down like you’re a Fugitive!)*

So this brings us to:

HOW CAN WE MAKE THIS HAPPEN?

Well, for starters, each product would have an RFID chip in it or on it. P&G has successfully placed RFID’s in barcodes… so this is well within the realm of possibility for today. Each RFID is encoded with information detailing the products batch number, distribution history, product information, price, and store inventory system it belongs to.

Currently, RFID tags cost around $0.10 each, but with economy of scale, that number could go down to near a penny each. Seriously, A PENNY!

Each RFID tag has a unique identifier that is then scanned automatically as you walk out of the store. When you walk out of the store, your Wegman’s app (or whatever payment app implements this) recognizes the RFID tags and prompts you to pay for the items you scanned with your phone app.

If the products in your cart match up with what the door sensor senses, then you can proceed on through without sounding an alarm.

There are a few security concerns with this model.

What if someone simply uses a high powered magnet to block any RFID signal from the products?

Magnets are currently used by shoplifters to disable anti-theft devices affixed to products, but I think RFID’s can operate at a frequency that would be immune to magnet interference. A signal jammer or mini EMP device would still be something to worry about though.

How would we catch the thief?

The thief would eventually have to get the product away from the magnet, or turn their jammer off to use the product or just turn it off thinking that they’re safely far away from the store, at which point, the RFID could communicate with the Thief’s phone and notify them that they still have to pay for the product. And if they don’t pay, then it’s logged. The phone can then use their social media contact information to notify the authorities that they’ve stolen specific items from the store. They are banned from the store, and picked up for shoplifting.

What if someone doesn’t have that store’s app on their phone?

This idea might be best implemented by a payment processor company. So odds are that whether it be Apple Pay, Google, AmazonPay, Paypal, or some other company can implement this or get it pre-loaded into factory phones.

Some registers would still remain for those who are technologically ancient.

Obviously things have to be ironed out in this model, but I think it’s fun thinking about how things can develop in the Future, especially that the technology is already available right now to implement this idea.

I’d like to see, either Paypal take it on, by getting retailers to upload their inventory systems on their servers so they can track the RFID’s through their payment gateway; Amazon could do this with their app, if they somehow get retailers to list products on their marketplace, or start using Amazon Pay; and individual retailers could do this through their own proprietary phone apps.

I think a simpler system will emerge, but I also think the industry will become more developed, complex, and diverse. Self checkout machines didn’t get rid of cashiers, and I don’t think integrated marketing/sales solutions will do it either. I think the new ‘express’ lane will be one where you pay with your phone using RFID tags. That’d be ideal for me. The one major hurdle would be weighing produce, unless you don’t get any, then it’s nothing to worry about.

What ideas do you have to implement this? Do you know any startups currently doing something like this? Let me know!!

If you know of any startups currently trying to implement this, please let me know in the comments below or at kelly |at| givengi.com.