Shoppers are hilariously reacting to ‘scary’ new addition in Kmart stores

Videos are being shared online of stunned customers coming across new futuristic team member perusing the aisles.

Kmart shoppers are sharing their reactions on social media to a new ‘futuristic’ addition rolling out in stores across Australia.

Customers browsing the aisles have been met with a moving robot perusing the shelves, called Tory.

Many are confused about its bizarre presence in store, and have taken to TikTok in recent months to ask what in the world they’re doing there.

Among the videos and comments online are people saying they’re both impressed and "scared" by the robots, while others are concerned it’s taking away jobs.

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People are sharing their interactions with Kmart's robot Tory. Source: TikTok.

"Full getting chased by the robot"

A shopper, who goes by the username Spanian, shared his interaction with one of the robots rolling around his local store this week.

“I'm in Kmart full getting chased by the robot...What are you doing? What's going on?" he asked in his clip.

After asking a staff member off camera, he was told the robot was “counting stock”. 

“It goes around checking sizes to see what's in stock, it goes aisle to aisle,” the man said, sounding surprised. 

Spanian's video has been watched 190,000 times, with people commenting about the interesting sight.

Someone wrote, “The way my kids would leg it if they seen this”,

Another user told him, “All Kmarts have it, it counts stock in the back.”

Others were concerned about the robot taking jobs.

“That’s a job gone. It’s all fun until these things take jobs over. AI is coming fast,” one said, with a second person writing, “'Goodbye people's jobs.”

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Shoppers worried about Tory taking jobs. Source: TikTok.

Tory can do stocktake once a day

A Kmart spokesperson confirmed to Kidspot, the robots were stock-counting machines.

Their name is Tory, short for 'inventory', which a few clever shoppers picked up on.

The Kmart spokesperson explained, “Tory uses RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) technology to count apparel stock each day by scanning RFID tags on our products”

“When we have an accurate view of stock, we can help more customers get the products they want, when they want it,” she said.

The Tory robots - which typically work overnight - have been rolling out in stores for more than a year.

“Tory helps our store team members focus on serving customers and helps them gain an accurate view of what products we have and where they are in the store,” the spokeswoman said.

“For Kmart, this new technology has meant that where we would previously do a stocktake once a year – Tory can do this once a day.”

In response to concerns about job cuts, the spokeswoman said the opposite was true.

“We’ve never had more team members, and our 44,000 strong team is only continuing to grow,” she said.

“Tory does not replace any existing jobs, as Tory only has one function – which is the ability to scan our tags and count stock."

Despite people saying online that Tory had interacted with them, the robot is unable to answer questions from customers.

Originally published as Shoppers are hilariously reacting to ‘scary’ new addition in Kmart stores