Giant Eagle goes live with checkout-free payment at GetGo store

Giant Eagle has publicly launched cashierless payment technology from Grabango at a GetGo Café Market in the Pittsburgh area, enabling shoppers to skip the checkout line when making purchases.

Berkeley, Calif.-based Grabango said Tuesday that the deployment at the GetGo store in Fox Chapel, Pa., marks the first commercial launch of its checkout-free solution. Giant Eagle and Grabango have been piloting the technology under a partnership announced in midsummer.

Giant Eagle’s GetGo store uses an app-based version of the Grabango solution. After downloading the fee Grabango mobile app, customers enter the store and start shopping as normal. Computer vision and machine learning technology track the products they select, and a running total of the items is tallied as they shop the store. When finished, customers scan the code in the app as they exit the store.

“We’re excited to bring checkout-free technology to our Pittsburgh-area shoppers. With Grabango, our GetGo guests are able to get in, get out and get going even faster with a more convenient, contactless shopping experience,” Laura Karet, president and CEO of Giant Eagle, said in a statement. “We look forward to success at our Fox Chapel GetGo and to rolling out more Grabango-powered convenience and grocery stores in the near future.”

Overall, Pittsburgh-based Giant Eagle operates 474 food and convenience stores, including over 200 supermarkets, across western Pennsylvania, north central Ohio, northern West Virginia, Maryland and Indiana.

Grabango noted that its solution requires no membership or check-in, turnstiles or other special gear at the store entrance, and the system doesn’t use facial recognition, maintaining shopper privacy. As customers leave the store, they can opt to receive digital receipts, which can be accessed as far back as a year. In the pilot, Giant Eagle tested multiple applications of Grabango’s technology, including the app-based solution and another that enables customers to pay with any tender they choose.

Giant Eagle CEO Laura Karet said the company plans to deploy the Grabango solution at more of its convenience and grocery stores.

“Together, Giant Eagle, GetGo and Grabango are offering new levels of convenience by solving everyone’s No. 1 frustration: waiting in checkout lines,” Grabango CEO Will Glaser commented. “Checkout-free convenience has arrived, and we’re so proud to be offering it with Giant Eagle.”

Founded in 2016, Grabango said Giant Eagle has been an “ideal proving ground” for its automated checkout technology, given that the retailer operates a variety of store formats, ranging from the 3,000-square-foot GetGo stores to Market District supermarkets that exceed 100,000 square feet. The tech company said it has been deploying its enterprise-class solutions — designed to retrofit existing stores and operate within their planogram and merchandise mix — to the grocery and convenience store chains since early 2019.

“Grabango's commercial deployment with Giant Eagle’s GetGo is only the beginning,” Glaser added, “and consumers can expect Grabango’s checkout-free technology to be widely available in the near future.”