We are proud to announce today our again-expanded partnership with Wakefern Food Corp., the largest retailer-owned cooperative in the United States. ShopRite Supermarkets, Inc. and Inserra Supermarkets, Inc., two of the largest owner groups within the Wakefern cooperative, have elected to scale Simbe's multimodal platform to all locations, bringing Tally – the world’s first, most advanced autonomous item-scanning robot – to twice as many Wakefern stores with nearly 70 deployments.
Wakefern executives, store managers & associates, and shoppers give their testimonials in this video.
Wakefern's success is a testament to their dedication to excellence and forward-thinking innovation, using data and capabilities that only Simbe provides to lift profits and power best-in-class experiences for store teams and shoppers. Once retailers know what’s happening inside of stores, they can optimize those locations in ways that fundamentally change their operating model and cost structure.
As top retailers deepen technology investments that enhance business and store team performance, this expansion underscores the exponential value that innovative retailers like Wakefern derive from using Simbe’s AI, robotics and computer vision solutions to digitize retail’s last data desert: the store interior.
After a successful, four-month proof of value, SRS reduced out-of-stocks by more than 50% and redirected as many as 50 hours of manual scan labor per store per week, enabling store associates to focus on more rewarding and higher-value tasks. It has since integrated Simbe’s platform into all 31 SRS-owned ShopRite locations.
“Tally has helped reduce out-of-stocks and pricing errors in even our highest-volume stores by providing our team with prioritized alerts in every category we carry,” said Michael Schoendorf, Vice President of Operations at SRS. “Because Tally tells us every time there is a single incorrect promotion or low-stock item, we’re able to better focus on the guest experience.”
Inserra has, similarly, expanded Simbe’s technology to 23 additional ShopRite locations. One of the first owner groups to implement Tally, Inserra has steadily grown its fleet and improved both store operations and shopper experiences since Wakefern and Simbe’s initial partnership began in 2022.
“To know that right now, the last unit of a certain product in aisle 14 was added to a shopper’s cart is invaluable. It's easy to miss when manually auditing a store with thousands of items,” said Jim Dorey, President and COO of Inserra. “Our team loves that Tally allows them to be more effective and focus more directly on caring for our customers quickly.”
We’re thrilled to continue growing our team and partnership with Wakefern, an exciting milestone on our journey to improve visibility across the retail ecosystem.
