Amazon Says It Won't Replace Whole Foods Cashiers With Computers... Yet (cnbc.com)

An anonymous reader shares a report: Amazon said it has no current plans to automate the jobs of cashiers in Whole Foods stores after it finishes acquiring the grocery chain. It also isn't planning any layoffs, according to a spokesperson. There is some speculation, however, that Amazon may change its plans and use new technology inside of Whole Foods locations. Commenting on Amazon's announcement from earlier today, LinkedIn CEO Jeff Weiner said, "Only one company on earth can buy grocery chain, be rumored to buy enterprise software company & in both cases be lauded for strategic vision."

Comments

Why not?

[grumpy-cowboy]

With a 15$/hour minimum wage, they will probably change their minds.

They'll replace cashiers with Echo Dots

[JoeyRox]

Echos are more productive, complain less, and don't show up to work with tattoos

Re:They'll replace cashiers with Echo Dots

[WrongMonkey]

What's wrong with tattoos? Does your food taste different if the cashier had some ink done?

Standard Acquisition process:

[netsavior]

This is standard process for any acquisition:

Step 1: Assure all employees of both the acquired and the parent company that their job is safe.
Step 2: Assure the public that it is business as usual.
Step 3: https://hardware.slashdot.org/... all your employees in potentially redundant areas fill out "Skill matrix" or other bullshit evaluations
Step 4: Make a shocking, totally unexpected, totally unpredictable move to lay off redundancies to the point where you can't properly function
Step 5: Bring in inexpensive contractors/scabs to bring the business back up to minimal function as you ring money out of the asset at peak efficiency.

Re:What's the purpose of this acquistion?

[EvilSS]

Whole Foods is all hippy-dippy Earth loving stuff I thought. What would Amazon want with that? It's like Walmart buying out an Amish quilter and saying they have no plans for a factory. No duh! They can't go high-tech, it would defeat the purpose of why it was successful in the first place.

Brick and Mortar locations with decent brand recognition (and, among their target customers it's a well liked brand) in high-income areas with a lot of cross-over with their existing customer base (You think hippy-dippy upper-middle class buyers don't also use Amazon?) They can also use these locations and their existing back-end to expand their grocery delivery business and get real experience in retail.