"No Worries"
"No Worries"
Video Link: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1gsTRivX9vJkUI30N5O097gsAaC2-I2gR/view?usp=sharing
ShopRight- Shopping Made Right. ShopRight is a shopping cart enhancement to prevent lost grocery items and forgetfulness during the grocery shopping process. ShopRight was designed to simplify the grocery-buying process by helping the consumer and provider keep track of their items and as well as to remove any ethical dilemmas that may arise.
Shoppers are in a hurry to select products, pay and leave the store. Many shoppers place bulk items on the bottom of their cart. It is as easy for the cashier to miss these items at checkout as it is for the consumer to forget the items on the bottom shelf when leaving. Once shoppers realize, they have an ethical decision to make: go back and pay for the product or leave without paying. Moreover, shoppers oftentimes forget to place their items from the bottom shelf of their carts into their cars.
Our creation, ShopRight is designed to ensure that these problems will never happen again! Our solution is to create a shopping cart-insert that can be easily attached onto any cart. This insert is equipped with force sensors that can detect items on the bottom shelf. Once a product has been detected, these sensors will send a signal to the LEDs on the handle signifying when the item has been placed on the bottom shelf. This LED is easy to spot by cashiers as customers push their cart through the line. The light on the handle also serves as a reminder as customers empty their carts in the parking lot. This product will save both consumers and providers from product loss and ethical decisions.
When one is shopping they are in a hurry to buy products and leave; however, humans are forgetful. After a consumer shops they walk to the register where the cashier scans all the products and then they pay and leave. But frequently the items left at the bottom shelf of the cart are not paid for because the cashier and shopper forgets about them and once the shopper realizes, he has an ethical decision to make: whether to go back and pay for the object to leave without paying. Additionally, another problem arises when the shopper gets to their car and unpacks all their groceries: they neglect the items on the bottom shelf of the cart.
Quora dealt with the following question: "What do you do if a cashier forgot to ring up an item?" There were 19 answers to this problem, and one of the answers, viewed by 4,000 people , related that it happened to her that she left water on the bottom shelf of the cart and forget to bring it up to pay for it, so she had to go back to the grocery store and pay for her item. Additionally, upon consulting with Michelle Y, the assistant manager of Trader Joe's store number 778, she stated that at least twice a month it happens that the store members find items in carts that were accidentally left behind by the shoppers.
To see our complete list of 15 brainstormed ideas you can go to our design notebook. https://docs.google.com/document/d/1jfDuA5J2BvJR_SKJv1KT6QQx12a0sj4NbULwPVh_QBw/edit?usp=sharing
(Debra Grasso. “What Do You Do If a Cashier Forgot to Ring up an Item?” Quora, www.quora.com/What-do-you-do-if-a-cashier-forgot-to-ring-up-an-item.)
The psychological characteristics of the target market would be people who are forgetful or always in a hurry like mothers and/ or fathers who are looking to get in and out of the grocery store. Also, the cashiers who spend their whole day by the counter, may oftentimes miss objects in the bottom shelf so the ShopRight will also benefit them
Another competitor is the LaneHawk LH5000, which is a camera placed at the bottom of the aisle that "will detect and recognize items that pass by the camera" and let the cashier know the items on the bottom shelf, so that he check for them. However, although this may solve the theft problem, it does not solve the forgetful problem of people leaving items in the bottom shelf and forgetting to put them in their car's trunk.
(“Datalogic SpA.” Fixed Retail Scanners for Loss Prevention -..., www.datalogic.com/eng/retail/fixed-retail-scanners/lanehawk-lh5000-pd-830.html.)
Super Target has mirrors on the bottom of their checkout aisles so that the cashier can look down and see if there are any items on the bottom shelf so that everything is paid for. However, the problem with this idea is that the cashier must look down in order to see the items in the bottom shelf, and he might forget to do so. Additionally, this does not help solve the problem that the shoppers might forget to leave items in the bottom shelf when placing their groceries in their car, as the mirrors are on the checkout isles, not the cart itself.
(“Check the Bottom of That Shopping Cart - or Else!” DVD Talk Forum, forum.dvdtalk.com/other-talk/529096-check-bottom-shopping-cart-else.html.)
The design goals that ShopRight should meet is to first be affordable and should be inexpensive enough so that the supermarket sees it as a cost-friendly helpful device. ShopRight must be big enough to cover the bottom shelf of the cart but also not take up too much of the height between the bottom shelf and the top shelf of the cart so that the shopper does not lose much space to store their belongings. Additionally, the force sensors should pick up any of the items placed on top of the ShopRight so it must be calibrated to the right weight-sensor.
We are all forgetful. Especially at the supermarkets. Cashiers and shoppers are always forgetting to scan and remove all products/ food from the cart. It happens more often then one would think that they leave food in the shopping cart, especially on the bottom shelf. Additionally, based on our survey to 61 people, 96.7% of people who answered were in agreement that this product would be useful and and over half of the interviewees replied that it has happened to them that they forget to pay for items in the bottom shelf and/or forget to put the bottom-shelf items in their car
"No Worries"
When first choosing our topic we were in between three ideas including the ShopRight product. As a group, we ended up choosing the ShopRight cart because it portrayed what we want the message behind our product to be; "No Worries". Society these days deals with so much stress we wanted to take away that stress from the shopping and shoppers experience.
The projects were were in between were a product that detects when a person left their keys in their car. As a group we decided not to go with this idea because not only was it too complex but it didn't make sense because many people in the North or in colder places leave their car running purposefully. As a result we scrapped the idea from this years CIJE competition.
The next idea we discussed was a light pole that would stand at a crosswalk and at night every time a car would speed in from of it it would start flashing lights that way the driver slows down. this project would help prevent pedestrians getting killed by speeding cars. We researched this idea and realized we would have to use a lot of help from the government in order to get our product on the market. Then we looked at the "market" and realized that there are far too many similar products. Due to these two realizations we ended up going with the ShopRight.
We thought adding a buzzer would be a good idea but then realized that the sound would be very annoying to the shoppers
We considered to add the led lights at the bottom however then understood the cashier wouldn't see them and it would defeat the whole purpose
We thought about having the cart scan everything as we shop but it didn't solve the problem
We talked about making a whole new cart in the beginning but that didn't make sense because that would be very wasteful
We thought about having the product go on both the bottom and top shelf but then realized that the cashier can see the top shelf
We thought to add a bluetooth feature to have the cart buzz when you leave the store if you have something in the bottom shelf but then understood that this doesn't solve the cashier problem
We talked about having an alarm as you leave the store but it would cause unnecessary embarrassment and would ruin the shopping experience
We thought about adding a scanner at the bottom shelf of the cart but this wasn't cost effective for the 100 per store.
We considered adding pressure sensors to the bags but realized that would never work because there are far too many bags to account for
We thought of an idea that would be a wristband that could connect through bluetooth to your cart and would beep and buzz if you leave the store with something in the bottom shelf of your cart
Based on the Michelle Y's (asistant manager at trader joes) statement that once every two months the crew members find carts with items accidentally left behind in Trade Joes, then if you keep that same probability for every one of the 40,583 supermarket stores in the US combined with all the other stores in the US that could use this product, like the 153,855 Clothing stores which could have this same problem, we assume that at least 3,000-5,000 stores would like our product
int LED = 11;
int fsr1;
int fsrAnalogPin0 = A0;
int fsr2;
int fsrAnalogPin1 = A1;
int fsr3;
int fsrAnalogPin2 = A2;
int fsr4;
int fsrAnalogPin3 = A3;
int fsr5;
int fsrAnalogPin4 = A4;
int fsr6;
int fsrAnalogPin5 = A5;
int LED1= 10;
void setup() {
Serial.begin(9600);
pinMode(LED, OUTPUT);
pinMode(LED1, OUTPUT);
}
void loop() {
fsr1 = analogRead(fsrAnalogPin0);
fsr2 = analogRead(fsrAnalogPin1);
fsr3 = analogRead(fsrAnalogPin2);
fsr4 = analogRead(fsrAnalogPin3);
fsr5 = analogRead(fsrAnalogPin4);
fsr6 = analogRead(fsrAnalogPin5);
Serial.print("fsr1 = ");
Serial.println(fsr1);
Serial.print("fsr2 = ");
Serial.println(fsr2);
Serial.print("fsr3 = ");
Serial.println(fsr3);
Serial.print("fsr4 = ");
Serial.println(fsr4);
Serial.print("fsr5 = ");
Serial.println(fsr5);
Serial.print("fsr6 = ");
Serial.println(fsr6);
if (fsr1 > 1 || fsr2 > 1 || fsr3 > 1||fsr4 > 1|| fsr5 > 1|| fsr6 > 1){
digitalWrite(LED, HIGH);
digitalWrite(LED1, LOW);
}
else
{
digitalWrite(LED1, HIGH);
digitalWrite(LED,LOW);
}
}
Our product was presented to 5 different people and we received feedback:
Person 1- "I loved it, I like that it does not need a special weight to turn on"
Person 2-"You should add a buzzer to alert the shopper"
Person 3- "make sure that it can handle the heaviest weights, against a buzzer because then it would be too loud and annoying"
Person 4- "It's really good, you should add more sensors that way it would work with the lightest weights"
Person 5-"It's cool, good idea, I would use this to make sure that don't forget my item and I like that it is very cost effective"
We also had to create an outlined business model
Our product is a B2B (buissness to buisness) because we are selling our product to businesses ex: Target, Publix etc.
We are planning on selling our product by going to grocery trade shows and approach store managers to buy our product to add to their carts
We would also contact shopping cart manufactures and sell them our product that way they can sell our product to their existing clients
We also estimate that we would sell the product for $55 and make a profit of $10 per sale as the cost of manufacturing is approximately $45.
After reading and listening to people's thoughts on our product we plan on adding a bluetooth and gps sensor that would cause the cart to buzz once you leave the store (if you have something in the bottom shelf) and will continue to buzz until you get back to the store and pay for the product.
Our interview had 61 responses and included demographic questions, like age and gender, which the main answer was women age 16-25, and included more product related questions as well like, "How often do you go to the grocery store?", which gave us an even spread of answers ranging from "Twice a week" to "not very often" and "Have you ever left items on the bottom shelf of the grocery store cart when putting items in your trunk?" Which 67% of people answered either often or rarely, thus proving that this problem is there. The last two questions were "Has the cashier ever not seen an item on the bottom shelf and didn't charge you for that item?", which 70% of people replied either rarely or often and "Do you think that our product is useful?" which 96.7% of interviewees answered yes.
In the future we would love to be granted the ability to mass produce ShopRight globally. As a start, we will work with manufacturers to produce an add-on that will be placed on the bottom shelf of the cart. This will be something that manufacturers can buy and add to the cart. Our goal is to be big and be in your supermarket and lastly improve the shopping experience for bth cashiers and our wonderful shoppers!
Computer Science Programmer and Engineer- Primarily focused on coding, setting up the Arduino and did market research
Scheck Hillel Community School
Prototype Builder - Primarily focused on the prototype and sewing all of the pieces for the product
Scheck Hillel Community School
Graphic designer- Primarily focused on Logo design, Icon design, producing the convincing video for our prototype, produced the slogan "No Worries", editing writing works, focused on survey results, and assisting in prototype development
Scheck Hillel Community School