Freshwater Digital Launches Access Control, Screening Technologies May 11, 2020 by Dave Haynes Grand Rapids, MI-based solutions provider Freshwater Digital has added pandemic-prompted digital access control and temperature scanning technology to its range of services. Many tweaks of Chinese solutions have emerged on the market, but Freshwater appears to have come up with something homegrown, more customized, and, arguably, more visible than the tablets on stands and counters …
Costa Rica Solutions Provider Pivots To Own Sanitizer-Display Hybrids To Stay Open May 5, 2020 by Dave Haynes Costa Rican digital signage solutions company IdeaMedia was looking, like a lot of companies, at a bumpy future brought on by the COVID-19 outbreak, so like a lot of small companies thrown into an unplanned lockdown, it pivoted. “We are trying to not only to remain alive, but also try to financially survive this …
Beabloo Launches Interaction Care Solution Designed To Address New Retail Norms April 30, 2020 by Dave Haynes Numerous companies have been announcing new products – like access control and thermal sensing displays – to help run businesses in the midst of COVID-19, but Barcelona-based retail tech firm Beabloo has gone several steps further by launching a full solution designed to address a variety of needs for what may be a new norm …
Gartner: Chinese Bricks And Mortar Back Open, But Sputtering In Recovery April 29, 2020 by Dave Haynes The research and advisory firm Gartner has an interesting piece up online about how retail is working in China, where COVID-19 started and has pretty much gone (maybe just for now). The piece suggests while stores are mostly back open, the aisles are not filled and bricks and mortar people are feeling even more pressure …
Germany’s xplace Markets Smart Entrance Kit For Retail April 29, 2020 by Dave Haynes One of the things discussed at length in the latest 16:9 Podcast, released overnight, is the use of displays, sensors and software to control foot traffic into stores and other businesses. The heads of the German consultancy invidis relate how these digital A-Frame displays are being used as a measure to limit access and meet …
Digital Signage Solution Tweaked To Enforce Social Distancing At Retail April 20, 2020 by Dave Haynes When I load up with my sanitizer and wipes, and grab my mask, to go out on a grocery or hardware run, I almost invariably end up in a line-up outside the store – with social distancing markers on the sidewalk and a cashier turned bouncer controlling access at the door. One person leaves, and …
Singapore Gov’t Authority Using Sensors To Visualize, Load-Balance Malls To Help Social Distancing April 6, 2020 by Dave Haynes The Singapore government has started published a really interesting real-time data visualization that provides citizens with the status of crowd levels at shopping malls. The government’s Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA) collaborated with mall operators on what has been dubbed Space Out – which visualizes the current crowd levels of malls, as well as patterns for …
ESLs Multi-Purposed As Health Messaging March 26, 2020 by Dave Haynes The Spar c-stores in, I think, Ireland are multi-purposing their electronic shelf labels to provide pricing AND health messaging. As spotted on Linkedin …
Smart Shelf Start-up Opens Autonomous C-Store At LA Apartment Complex March 25, 2020 by Dave Haynes A kinda sorta digital signage tech startup focused on smart retailing has opened an autonomous micro c-store in Orange County, California that uses a combination of LED ribbon “smart” shelves, payments systems and AI-based computer vision. Adroit Worldwide Media, the guys behind the AWM Smart Shelf you may have seen at shows like NRF, has …
Timing Is Everything: Digital Signage Paired With Hand Sanitizer No Longer Novelty Product March 23, 2020 by Dave Haynes Timing is sometimes everything when it comes to marketing a product, and it can take a compelling event to shift a product from being regarded as “interesting” to one that is right for the moment. In my dark period when I did business development for a software company, more than a decade ago, I had …
