RTIH rounds up the stand out retail systems deals, deployments and pilots from the past seven days. Featuring Walmart, Aldi UK, Tesco, Aldi Nord and Shopify.

Nespresso has debuted its new experiential boutique concept in the UK at the Bluewater, Kent shopping centre. 

The aim is to meet shoppers’ changing needs by offering immersive, localised and personalised experiences.

The store opened its doors to the public last week. It includes an interactive ‘Taste & Discover’ area, where customers can explore and create their own coffee recipes using iPad tutorials and Nespresso machines.

An augmented reality experience, meanwhile, gives people the opportunity to immerse themselves in the stories, heritage and expertise behind Nespresso coffees and understand how capsules are recycled.

Aldi Nord is set to test out a checkout free store in Utrecht, The Netherlands, early next year, powered by Trigo technology.

To enter, customers will need to scan a QR code, with all selected items being tracked by a combination of shelf sensors and camera technology. 

These details are then sent to a customer app, enabling a contactless and automatic payment process when leaving the store.

Canadian e-commerce platform giant Shopify has built an internal game that aims to make virtual hangouts more fun.

Shopify Party is pitched as an investment and experimentation in the future of remote work.

British lighting brand, Bert Frank, has deployed Brightpearl tech to streamline post-purchase operations and end manual processes.

Tesco has launched Clubcard Pay+, a new way for customers to pay, save and pick up Clubcard points.

InPost has announced a new partnership with Tesco, which will see its automated parcel machines (APMs) deployed across the grocery giant’s entire large format store estate in the UK, potentially up to 500 sites, by the end of November.  

Shoppers will be able to collect their online orders or send parcels, and also drop off returns in seconds thanks to InPost’s paperless Instant Returns service.

Costa Coffee has launched a trial of a new blockchain technology powered reusable cup scheme called BURT. 

BURT – which stands for ‘Borrow, Use, Reuse, Take Back’ – started last week across 14 stores in Glasgow and will last for six months.

Recipe shopping technology provider Northfork has partnered with Buzzfeed’s Tasty, a social food network, and AdAdapted, a shopping list marketing and insights platform.

The three will provide an ‘add-to-bag’ service to CPG brands that will enable consumers to directly select items for pickup or delivery at Walmart stores in the US.

Canadian pet supply retailer Ren’s Pets is saying goodbye to Oracle Bronto, and hello to omnichannel customer engagement platform Emarsys.

Online fashion retailer Asos is to invest £14 million in a new tech hub in Belfast, Northern Ireland and create 184 new jobs over the next three years.

Dutch supermarket chain Jumbo has opened a chat checkout in Udenhout.

This is a checkout line where slower is better and people are encouraged to have a chinwag with an assistant as they’re paying for their groceries.

The first of these was opened in the summer of 2019. According to Jumbo, that was a huge success and now the time is right to expand the concept. 

Walmart is binning its layaway programme before the 2021 holiday season, and replacing it with a buy now, pay later option. 

The retailer is working with Affirm on this.

Aldi UK has announced Greenwich, London as the location for its first ever checkout free store.

This will use a system of cameras, sensors and artificial intelligence to identify the items customers take from shelves, alleviating the need to pay at a till.