Unattended retail – a sleeper market inside our Digital Lifestyle and Digital Infrastructure themes
With transaction friction increasing across our Digital Lifestyle investing theme, one underappreciated market is unattended retail even though it is poised to deliver significant growth in the coming years. One driving aspect of digital shopping that is carrying over to unattended retail is the consumer convenience to grab, pay and go without waiting on line or waiting for a cashier to re-appear. We see this rise of unattended retail self-payments as a proof point for Amazon Go stores. As vending machine companies, cooler manufacturers and retailers embrace this aspect of our Digital Lifestyle theme, it also means demand for the sensors, scanners, readers, cameras and other technology that allow the unattended transaction to occur and that’s a driver for our Digital Infrastructure theme.
One of the downsides to this, of course, is as this payment modality grows, it likely means fewer jobs to be had.
Unattended retail is on the move, with the American interactive kiosk market projected to grow by 7.2 percent annually through 2021. Self-service kiosks generated annual revenues of $218 million in 2016, and vending machines bring in $7 billion in sales each year, according to the PYMNTS Unattended Retail Tracker.
Source: ShelfX Brings Self-Service Payments To Coolers | PYMNTS.com
