When Amazon first showcased its ‘Just Walk Out’ technology back in 2016, it was hailed as the future of in-store retail. No more queues. No more checkout. Via a system of AI-powered cameras, sensors and a smartphone app, customers at Amazon Go and Fresh stores could take the groceries they want off the shelf, and literally just walk out.

The bill was tallied by the AI system as they shopped, and automatically charged to the app on their smartphone. Along with everything else it had done to revolutionize ecommerce, Amazon had now apparently magicked away the need for POS.

We’ve become accustomed to Amazon’s innovations changing the shape of retail. Which makes it mildly surprising that the Seattle-based giant has now rolled back on what must surely rank as one if its boldest interventions yet. As reports suggested earlier this year, Amazon has now confirmed that it is pulling out the grab-and-go systems from all of its Amazon Fresh stores in the US.

There are lots of theories going around as to the thinking behind the move. An important point is that Amazon isn’t abandoning the ‘smart’ shopping concept altogether. In its US Fresh stores, Just Walk Out will be replaced by Dash Carts, a scan-and-go system that puts shoppers in control of registering their own items as they move around the store using a ‘smart’ shopping cart.

Dash Carts have been running in parallel with Just Walk Out in some Fresh stores for a few years now. While Amazon plugs the technology as another way to ‘beat the queue’ at checkout, it’s a step back from the original stated intention behind Just Walk Out tech to scrap the need for checkout/POS altogether. Dash Carts operate as a mobile form of self-service – kiosks on wheels, if you like. Yes, it’s POS in a novel form. But there’s no attempt to automate away POS altogether from the customer experience.

POS in customer’s hands

And that raises one of the more intriguing arguments that has been put forward as to why, in the end, Just Walk Out tech hasn’t done what Amazon hoped it would. Maybe consumers just weren’t ready for it. Speaking to CIO, Matt Arcaro, research director for computer vision tools and technology at IDC, said: “The biggest challenge is just the novelty of it. How do you get people to want to integrate it into their day?”

Amazon itself has hinted that CX has been a key factor in their decision, suggesting that in larger grocery store formats at least, customers prefer the flexibility of Dash Cart. An underlying issue with Just Walk Out tech is that the complex (and costly) systems of on-shelf sensors, cameras and back-end computing infrastructure put limitations on merchandising. Changing up what’s on shelf becomes a major task. Amazon believes consumers prefer a more traditional grocery store layout, with more freedom to explore options and offers.

That raises important questions about prioritizing customer preferences and needs. It has long been assumed that wait times at checkout represent the biggest friction point for shoppers. So do away with checkout, right? But maybe we’ve seen with the Just Walk Out experiment that that’s too radical a step to make, at least in one move. We’re all creatures of habit, and when we behave as consumers, we like the comforts of things we are familiar with. Including something resembling a checkout.

On the other hand, Amazon’s dash to its Dash Cart format may also be yet more proof of just how powerful a pull self-service is for modern consumers. Whether it’s a kiosk, a mobile app or a digitized shopping cart, maybe it’s control over the POS experience that shoppers are looking for, rather than having it removed altogether.