Mobile devices and apps have lots of value for retailers beyond the use of mobile payment capabilities that replace use of cash, debit or credit cards.
Starbucks might be the best example of a retailer whose mobile payment app is as much about loyalty as it is expediting payments.
In fact, services such as Google Wallet and Isis think the big value lies in a variety of loyalty and marketing services such payment apps can provide.
Many grocers in the United States are not waiting for such mobile wallet efforts to get established, and are launching their own mobile apps, designed to provide value for customers while they are shopping. The important observation is that there are many ways to use mobile devices in a retail setting aside from the actual payment process, which seems to get most of the attention.
Neither "showrooming" or "payments" are the problems the grocer apps are trying to solve. Rather, the grocer apps aim to improve the shopping experience in other ways, frequently by enabling mobile shopping lists and applying all relevant coupons and offers, based on a particular shopper's past buying history.
In a way, those efforts aim to personalize the shopping experience by building on past buying behavior and rewarding repeat shopping with special offers that often are customized for each shopper, based on that history.
At least in some part, the branded mobile apps are an attempt to fend off use of third-party shopping lists, and in part an effort to provide more "stickiness" for repeat customers.
Grocery store chain Safeway is beefing up its mobile strategy with a new shopping application, available for both Android and iOS devices, that allows users to build shopping lists and then delivers coupons and other offers to a customer’s loyalty card that are applied automatically at check out.
The "Just for U" app offers "personalized pricing" on items Safeway believes a particular shopper wants, based on buying history, and all special pricing is applied automatically when the shopper checks out, using the loyalty card.
Safeway isn't the only grocery chain to start using such apps. Harris Teeter's "ht mobile" app, available for Android and iOS devices, provides automated prescription ordering and refills, a mobile shopping list, barcode scanning, a favorite items feature, automated delivery of coupons, an item search function and driving directions to the nearest location.
The Harris Teeter app is similar in many ways to the SuperValu mobile app that can be used at Albertsons, Cub Foods and Shop 'n Save.
In fact, SUPERVALU's retail technology group provides information technology solutions to other retailers, ranging from electronic payment services to scheduling, shrink-prevention services, computing and mobile infrastructure, gift card programs and other consulting services.
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