Giant Eagle offers 'Scan Pay & Go' at New Kensington store
The Giant Eagle in New Kensington is among about 70 of the grocery giant’s 215 stores where customers can skip checkout lines by scanning and bagging their groceries as they shop.
Giant Eagle, based in O’Hara, introduced its “Scan Pay & Go” system to the store on Tarentum Bridge Road late last month.
It is the only Giant Eagle in the Alle-Kiski Valley area that currently offers it. It will be in more than 80 stores once the company completes its expansion phase in the next few weeks.
“Customers are clamoring for a convenient shopping experience,” spokeswoman Jannah Jablonowski said. “If there’s technology out there that can help us give that to them, we need to be doing that.”
Scan Pay & Go was introduced and tested at the Giant Eagle Market District at The Waterworks mall starting in March 2018 before being expanded to more locations. Jablonowski said customer feedback has been “overwhelmingly positive,” and is leading the company to reimagine the layout of its checkout areas to improve traffic flow.
“Once we get people to try the service, they say it’s a game-changer for them,” she said.
How it works
With the system, customers use a handheld device provided at the store or a smartphone app to scan the items they want to buy as they go through the store.
A Giant Eagle Advantage Card is required to use the system.
If using a smartphone, it has to be connected to the store’s Wi-Fi system, Jablonowski said.
Customers can put their purchases in their own reusable bags or use plastic bags provided at the scanner station and available throughout the store. Weighing stations are located in the produce section for purchases, such as bananas, where prices are based on weight.
To pay, customers can go to a dedicated Scan Pay & Go checkout station or through any checkout lane, including self-checkouts.
A shopper’s first impression
Mariann Waltz, of New Kensington, tried the system for the first time Friday. She used the app on her smartphone.
“I thought I can get in and out quicker,” she said for why she wanted to try it. “This seems practical. It’s going to go right from my cart to my car.”
Waltz found scanning things with her phone was easy.
She liked that it gave her a running total as she shopped.
“It’s easy to scan,” she said. “You know the price is right because you’re seeing it.”
After checking out, Waltz said she’ll use it again.
“I like it a lot, if you don’t have a huge order,” she said.
This is not the first time that Giant Eagle has tried to offer such a system. An “earlier iteration” had been tried once before.
“I think we were a little bit ahead of our time in terms of what the technology was letting us do,” Jablonowski said.
Company says no jobs lost, union cautious
Like the fears that were expressed over self-checkouts, Jablonowski said that Scan Pay & Go won’t result in jobs being lost, but in stores using its employees in other ways. She noted that the New Kensington store is actively hiring.
That such technology would result in job loss is a “common misconception,” she said.
“We can be a lot more smart with helping our stores allocate the resources they do have,” she said.
United Food & Commercial Workers Local 1776 Keystone State represents more than 6,500 Giant Eagle employees at corporate and private stores. Its president, Wendell Young IV, said he isn’t opposed to the system provided Giant Eagle is doing it for the right reasons.
“They should reinvest the savings into more customer service,” he said. “We’ll have to see what Giant Eagle decides to do.”
Young said he recognizes it’s hard to stop technological change, and understands customers’ desire for convenience.
“Those who simply do these things to save money and reduce service to the customer end up looking more and more like Walmart — with dirty stores and no customer service. It doesn’t go well for them,” he said. “If Giant Eagle is doing this for the right reasons, it can improve hours for members. If they do this just to save money and not put more back into customer service, I think it’s going to be a mistake for them.”
Young said the first time Giant Eagle tried to use such a system was a “disaster,” with the company shelving it because it was losing money from too much leaving stores without being paid for. The new system is in only a few stores where the union represents employees.
“We don’t think they’re getting much traction right now. Not a lot of customers are using it,” he said. “Having said that, eventually these kind of things are going to catch on. More and more customers will get comfortable with it, and companies will figure out how to stop the theft.”
With the investment in the equipment, training and signage, Jablonowski said Scan Pay & Go is here to stay, and likely to be expanded to more locations.
But it won’t become the only way to shop.
“Everybody has their own shopping habits,” Jablonowski said. “We don’t want to force people to change their shopping habits. We want to have options available.”
Brian C. Rittmeyer, a Pittsburgh native and graduate of Penn State University's Schreyer Honors College, has been with the Trib since December 2000. He can be reached at brittmeyer@triblive.com.
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