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METRO Group Future Store Initiative

Developing the future for Retail

Retailing is undergoing a fundamental modernization process. The use of innovative technologies not only creates new opportunities for optimizing the business processes but also opens up new possibilities for an individual customer marketing. Over the next five to ten years, the relationship between retailers, manufacturers and customers will change fundamentally. The METRO Group Future Store Initiative was founded with objective of actively shaping the future of retailing and intensively promoting the modernization of this sector on a national and international level; it is a strategic cooperation together with SAP, Intel, T-Systems and over 60 other cooperation partners from the service, IT and consumer goods industries.

The objective of the METRO Group Future Store Initiative is to test and further develop new concepts and technical systems geared towards increasing efficiency in retailing. The focus is on the closest possible orientation towards the individual expectancies and needs of the consumer. Under this initiative, solutions to make shopping more comfortable and easy for the customer by using the latest technologies are demonstrated. This involves the further improvement of service and product quality, which have already reached a high standard in retailing, as well as the multiple forms of individual customer address.

The METRO Group contributes its competence as one of the leading, future-oriented retail groups to this strategic cooperation. It already demonstrated its significance as a motor for innovation and a driving force in trading in many sectors. The use of the latest technologies in all phases of the value added chain represents an important element in the consistent optimization of the METRO Group's sales concepts.

Radio Frequency Identification (RFID), i.e. the non-contact identification of objects, plays a particular role in the further development of modern technologies to increase the efficiency of the process chain in retailing. This technology can be applied for automatic product identification throughout the complete value added chain: from manufacture to transport and storage logistics through to sales and customer services. Computer chips on the packages of the goods can store important product information such as price and best before date which is retrieved by transceivers. Trading companies can use this technology for inventory and order management and consumers can use it for shopping. As an efficient and high-performance alternative to the traditional bar code, the RFID technology can provide decisive impulses to retailing to improve the complete value added chain.

The METRO Group Future Store Initiative will test the complex interaction of RFID and other technologies under real life conditions and take promising approaches to market maturity. So far, only individual applications of such technologies or individual systems have been implemented in retailing. In the Future Store, they will be combined for the first time. With this project, development of benefit-oriented solutions is promoted that will bring decisive advantages for both the customer as well as the retailing and consumer goods sectors.