Amazon’s Just Walk Out technology was developed to address a simple universal truth—people do not like waiting in lines. To remove this customer pain point, we leveraged technologies like computer vision, sensor fusion, and generative artificial intelligence (generative AI) so customers can grab what they need and leave the store knowing that they will be automatically and accurately billed for their purchases.
For the last several years, we have been offering Just Walk Out technology as a service to third-party retailers, and today, you can find Just Walk Out technology–enabled stores at more than 120 third-party locations. These third-party locations include airports, stadiums, university campuses, grocery and convenience stores, theme parks, cafes, and more in the U.S., UK, Australia, and Canada. Just Walk Out technology is also available in dozens of Amazon-owned stores.
As businesses embrace the benefits of Just Walk Out technology, our team continues to innovate to enable retailers to offer an expanded array of products, bring checkout-free stores to new locations and new shoppers, and increase throughput and sales1.
Today, I am delighted to announce yet another innovation—“badge pay”—which will bring the convenience of Just Walk Out technology to health care settings, so doctors, nurses, and other health care staff can grab food and beverages at all hours by simply scanning their employee badge. St. Joseph’s/Candler at its Candler Hospital Campus in Savannah, Georgia, is the first U.S. hospital with a Just Walk Out technology store and the first location to offer the badge pay capability. We look forward to bringing Just Walk Out technology and our employee badge pay capability to more health care facilities.
Photo by St. Joseph’s/Candler
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Significance of Just Walk Out technology with badge pay
Shoppers love that Just Walk Out technology stores support a wide range of payment options, including Amazon One, and other traditional payment instruments like credit cards, mobile wallets, QR Code payments, and university meal plans. However, many hospital staff do not carry their wallets and phones during working hours, which can make the purchase of food and beverages inconvenient. Additionally, with most hospital cafeterias and stores closed at night, quick and easy access to food becomes a challenge for hospital staff during overnight shifts. Just Walk Out technology with badge pay will provide health care employees 24/7 access to food and beverages, while expanding the functionality of their employee badge beyond identification and building access to payments linked to payroll.
Badge pay capability links employee badges to their payroll
With Just Walk Out technology’s new badge pay capability, health care workers can link their employee badges with their payroll deduct account. This means doctors, nurses, and other hospital staff can enter their hospital’s Just Walk Out technology store by scanning their badge at the entry pedestal, shop for what they need, and then leave the store without standing in line to pay. The purchase amount will be automatically deducted from their payroll deduct account. Employees can look up the receipt and account balance in their hospital’s badge pay web portal or mobile app. To enable the badge pay capability at Candler Hospital, we worked with CBORD, a leading provider of health care automation solutions. Caregivers and other visitors to the hospital can also shop at the Just Walk Out technology–enabled hospital store with their credit/debit cards or mobile wallets, and access their receipts.
Photo by St. Joseph’s/Candler“Amazon’s Just Walk Out technology supports our smart medicine strategy by providing high-tech solutions to our patients, visitors and co-workers, even with food service,” said Paul P. Hinchey, president and CEO of St. Joseph’s/Candler. “With this technology, Candler Hospital co-workers needing a quick snack or a meal during the third shift, as well as visitors taking care of friends or family members, have a convenient way to purchase the meals, snacks, and drinks they need so they can quickly get back to their loved ones. Once we evaluate its impact post launch, we will determine how this technology might be utilized on our other campuses.”
Morrison Healthcare, a leading national food and nutrition provider serving more than 950 hospitals and healthcare systems, operates the Just Walk Out technology store at Candler Hospital.
“Just Walk Out technology brings a forward-looking approach to hospital food access to better serve both caregivers and guests,” said Tim Pierce, CEO of Morrison Healthcare. “As we continue to bring advanced digital options to our partners and create a frictionless environment for healthcare dining, Candler serves as an impressive model for how this can be achieved thoughtfully and strategically.”
Badge pay is only our latest innovation in checkout-free shopping. Other recent advancements include:
- New sensor capabilities that enable an expanded array of products. Today, Just Walk Out technology–enabled stores use a variety of sensors, including cameras, shelf sensors, and weight sensors, as well as RFID tags to determine who took what. These sensor options are designed to give merchants the flexibility to pick the right technology mix that will best serve their needs. For example, an airport store might choose to go with a vision-based system with cameras and shelf sensors, while a fan gear outlet at a sports stadium might choose RFID technology, and a larger location might choose to adopt a combination of these technologies.
- Multiple store formats that meet different retail requirements. We understand that different retailers have different needs based on their operational model. For example, an existing university campus store might need to remain open around the clock for students to grab food and other items, or a stadium might decide to take advantage of unused spaces to quickly deploy new concession stands to sell food, beverages, or fan merchandise. That’s why Just Walk Out technology offers retailers multiple checkout-free store options that range from custom retrofit of existing stores to prefabricated kits for various retail needs to unattended stores that can remain operational at all hours.
- Payment options that cater to customer needs. To bring the convenience of Just Walk Out technology to students at universities, we worked with campus card providers—like CBORD, Grubhub, and Transact—so students can use their meal plan accounts to enter Just Walk Out technology–enabled stores on campuses, grab what they need, and walk out. The purchase amount will be deducted from the student’s meal plan. Similarly, to enable badge pay integration at Just Walk Out technology stores in health care facilities, we worked with CBORD.
- Just Walk Out Analytics that provides retailers with actionable insights while preserving customer privacy. Just Walk Out Analytics provides aggregated and anonymized analytics to retailers, delivering insights on how products are considered, picked up, returned to the shelf, and purchased. This helps retailers identify low conversion products and items that should be placed or promoted together to increase basket sizes. Customer trust and privacy remain paramount, and Just Walk Out technology does not use or collect any biometric information.
As our team continues to innovate and deliver new checkout-free capabilities, customers and retailers are already seeing the benefits—and we’re just getting started.
1In September 2022, Lumen Field, home of the NFL’s Seattle Seahawks installed its first Just Walk Out technology store, the District Market. During the 2022 season, the store saw a 60% increase in customer throughput, and the total transactions per game doubled compared to the traditional concession stand that previously stood in the same location. By the end of the season in early 2023, the team saw transactions per game in that location increase 85% and total sales per game increase 112%.
