Amazon growing its grocery footprint

The beat goes on for Amazon’s food retail push and the general shift toward grocery transactions that require no checkout clerks.

A report from the Seattle Times said the e-commerce and food retail operator plans to open grocery store locations in “Seattle, California, and the Chicago and Washington, D.C., areas.”

Some of the new stores will reportedly feature conventional checkout experiences.

According to Amazon, however, an Amazon Go store planned for Redmond, Wash., in the Seattle area, will have cashierless checkout technology.

“Never wait in line to check out again,” Amazon teases online. Shoppers enter the stores by scanning a smartphone app. Once inside, they can take items off shelves and just walk out. Amazon’s technology, including overhead cameras, keeps track of what they buy and charges customers after they leave.

Amazon opened its first Go Grocery on Capitol Hill in Seattle this year after a lengthy development period, its latest move in an ongoing effort to capture more of consumers’ grocery budget.

As of July 6, Amazon had 186 open positions listed for its Amazon Go operations, with the greatest concentration of jobs — 76 — involving software development, and most of the jobs are based in Seattle.

This article appeared at ProgressiveGrocer.com.