Walmart, Sam’s Club integrating generative AI into shopping and store experiences

Walmart and Sam’s Club are integrating generative artificial intelligence (AI) into more store functions to help make employees’ jobs more efficient and better serve customers.

"AI probably infiltrates almost every area across our business from how we do the work we do to how we support the customers and members we have to the actual member experience itself," Cheryl Ainoa, executive vice president and chief technology officer for Sam’s Club, told FOX Business at CES 2024.

For example, Ainoa pointed to an automated floor scrubber that uses computer vision to guide it around the stores that the company began to use for mapping the layout of stores to help with planning. 

"Since we had the cameras and the information, we started using it to actually do inventory and be able to track for us – where do we have gaps in our inventory, where do we need to fill items in the store, where is there work that needs to be done," she explained. 

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"And then using AI to automatically use that to create for the associates and for the manager actual task lists so when the associate shows up they actually have a list of ‘here’s the top three things that need to be addressed immediately’ and the manager gets the same thing of ‘here’s the top three things across the store, here’s the places where you’ve got inventory out, here’s where you’ve got something that’s mismarked."

"We’ve been able to take that AI into one of the lowest-tech devices you can think of – a mopping machine – and turn it into actually giving us real-time store information, club information across the board and using it to help guide our associates in what’s the next best step or what’s the next best work for them to be doing," Ainoa said.

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Shoppers at Sam’s Club also benefit from the company’s integration of AI through its scan-and-go feature.

"As you’re going and scanning your items and putting them in your cart so that you can then just head to the exit, we are using AI and the information we have on your previous purchase history – assuming you’ve given us permission – to help say, ‘hey, did you forget, don’t forget, or there’s maybe things of interest,’" Ainoa said.

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As an example, she explained that a shopper buying 18-month diapers may be prompted to consider whether they should buy diaper rash medicine to go along with it.

Both Walmart and Sam’s Club are using generative AI to help users easily find the items they’re searching for, Ainoa said. For instance, a shopper looking to buy a cell phone for a pre-teen is confronted with different considerations than an adult looking to buy a cell phone for personal use or work. A family may place more emphasis on parental controls, durability, or cost, depending on the circumstances.

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As a shopper interacts with the generative AI search functionality, the tool remembers their preferences and helps provide recommendations that can then be revised if the shopper reassesses their priorities in terms of the product’s features. It can inform the user about what customers are saying in reviews or if particular attributes are better for one option versus another.

"It’s really summing that up and making it simple so it gets information in people’s hands so that now they can make the real decisions," Ainoa explained.