Futurist reveals the next big shopping and payment trends

A popular cafe is offering customers an unforgettable experience, with experts claiming it’s the “way of the future”. But there’s a catch.

There might be no such thing as a free lunch, but in one US cafe at least, there is free coffee.

It sounds like a Black Mirror plot,but Shiru Cafe, located near Brown University in Rhode Island, offers free coffee to students — with one big catch.

Customers pay their tab with their personal data, including their names, numbers, email addresses and university majors, which is then shared with other companies for marketing purposes.

And according to futurist Gihan Perera, the author of new book Disruption by Design, it’s a concept that’s likely to catch on.

“Generation X and baby boomers are very careful with their privacy and data but Gen Y and Z are more than happy to share it because they recognise the convenience of access in exchange for giving out some of their private data,” he told news.com.au.

Would you hand over your data if it meant a free latte? Picture: iStock

But that’s not the only huge change coming our way when it comes to shopping — and paying.

FAREWELL, CASH

Mr Perera said we’re already well on our way to becoming a cashless society, and that more and more people were now paying for things via FitBits and smartphones.

But he said the world was on the verge of going a step further, with companies in China already allowing people to pay via facial recognition.

He said biometric payments, including facial recognition and thumbprints, would become increasingly widespread in future.

NO MORE CHECKOUTS

Last January, Amazon pioneered the queue and cash-free supermarket concept through the launch of the groundbreaking Amazon Go store in Seattle.

It allows customers to simply take what they want and go without having to deal with lines and cashiers, with every item taken from shelves added to a virtual cart linked to a customer’s credit card.

Later that year, the concept landed Down Under when Woolworths became the first Australian retailer to use the buy-and-walk-out technology, which has since been fitted out in a number of stores.

But according to Mr Perera, that hi-tech idea will soon be the norm.

“You won’t have to line up anymore and there will be no more self-checkout — you can walk out without a security guard chasing you,” he said.

“Every little pain point in the shopping experience, retailers are trying to fix, and one of those is the checkout. So if there’s some way to reduce or eliminate that, they’ll do it.”

Mr Perera said it would take “a bit longer” for smaller, independent shops to follow suit but that the majority of retailers would likely sign up to an aggregate service similar to Paypal which would automatically collect payment from customers on their behalf.

According to futurist Gihan Perera, the future is already here. Picture: Supplied

FREE DELIVERY

A few years ago, UK supermarket chain Tesco opened a “virtual store” at a railway station which allowed shoppers to scan the QR codes of products on screen with their phones, place their orders before work, and have them delivered by the time they got home that evening.

Mr Perera said it was only a matter of time before similar technology became commonplace here.

“Again, they eliminated that pain point of driving to the shops, parking, walking into the shop — it was all done automatically and conveniently in a place (commuters) were in already,” he said.

“The biggest costs retailers have is actually the store space — lease costs are extremely expensive, so if they eliminate that through virtual stores, that cost saving could be passed onto customers in other ways like free delivery.

“Customers are happy to pay for convenience but also more and more of us expect free shipping to be included as a right and not a perk. So customers won’t necessarily pay more for delivery, unless retailers try and run (virtual and bricks-and-mortar) stores side-by-side.”

DEMISE OF FITTING ROOMS

It sounds very sci-fi, but Mr Perera said virtual reality and augmented reality would soon be an essential part of shopping.

He said augmented reality (AR) — which involved digital information being overlaid into your world — was already being rolled out, while virtual reality (VR) — which transports a person into a digital world — was a few more years away from becoming commonplace.

But Mr Perera said many big retailers already offered AR experiences.

The Ikea Place app, for example, lets you virtually “place” 3D, true-to-scale furnishings in your space, while Sephora’s Virtual Artist app lets you try virtual makeup on at home.

Mr Perera said that technology would soon eliminate the need for traditional fitting rooms altogether.

VR and AR means no more fitting rooms. Picture: iStock

“Because of augmented and virtual reality, a little further down the track you’ll be able to virtually try on clothes before you buy them,” he said.

“The idea is you would put on a headset, upload a body scan of yourself warts and all, and then your virtual reality avatar could try on clothes for you so you can see how it looks.

“You will also upload everything in your wardrobe, so you can mix and match and accessorise.”

SO WHEN WILL IT HAPPEN?

If all this sounds a bit far-fetched to you, you’re not alone — but apparently, technology that seems radical now will be part of everyday life within a few short years.

“The future seems far away in time but sometimes it’s more a matter of distance — sometimes, these things are already happening in other parts of the world and … it will be here before you know it,” Mr Perera said.

“For us as customers it’s an exciting time, because a lot of the pain of shopping is being reduced or eliminated.”

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