Promotion of Digitalization to Improve Convenience
Basic Approach
Due to the acceleration of digitization in recent years, the decline in the working-age population, and changes in customer needs and workstyles, the role of convenience stores changes in conjunction with the shifting demands of users.
FamilyMart is working to realize a next-generation convenience store model by leveraging the latest digital technologies such as unmanned payment stores and digital signage, and by implementing FamiPay (a digital payment system) across our store network and customer contact points. This effort will help us achieve sustainable growth even in drastically changing times and become an even more indispensable presence in the local community.
The use of humanoid AI assistants, remote-controlled robots and other types of new digital technologies will also help to save store operations labor, improve customer convenience and satisfaction, and enhance corporate value.
Evolving into a New Kind of Information Dissemination Base
In September 2021, FamilyMart established Gate One Corp. in collaboration with Itochu Corporation to provide services that transcend the boundary between the real and the digital. Gate One distributes digital content via large monitors (digital signage) in our stores. Multiple monitors supply customers with enjoyable content such as product information, music, and news that is linked to items on the sales floor, as well as provide useful community-based content such as events announcements and crime prevention notices (scam warnings, etc.). As of July 2023, such digital signage has been installed at 5,000 stores and we will continue to expand their use in more stores over time.
Enhancing Convenience through FamiPay
The FamiPay app was launched in 2019 for customers to save money and make shopping at FamilyMart more convenient. The app was downloaded more than 15 million times by February 2023.
In addition to discount coupons, bonus payouts, and linkups with the point programs of various other companies, we are also actively developing new services focused on customer convenience that are not necessarily limited to our own services, such as the FamiPay Next Month Payment service for deferred payment when one’s FamiPay balance is insufficient and FamiPay Bill Payment, which allows payment of utility and other bills (payment slips) by reading the barcode on the bill/slip with the FamiPay app, as well as a FamiPay Loan option so customers can access money for small financial needs in their daily lives.
We communicate with the customers who visit FamilyMart at the store level to actively introduce and recommend FamiPay to them as a very convenient tool. Increasing the adoption of cashless transactions will improve customer convenience and satisfaction and reduce store workloads.
Practical Stores with an Unmanned Payment System
We entered a business alliance with TOUCH TO GO Co., Ltd., a developer of unattended payment systems, for the practical implementation of unattended payment convenience stores. In 2021, we opened our first unattended payment store, Famima!! Sapia Tower/S, as a new type of store that can meet small-scale needs. As of March 2023, we have opened 16 stores.
These unmanned payment stores use cameras and sensors to recognize customers and products, allowing customers to enter, pick up products, and self-pay at the cash register installed near the exit. Compared with staffed registers, such systems allow customers to make purchases more easily and in a shorter amount of time, are expected to help reduce labor shortages and labor costs, and also address the growing need for contactless devices that developed in the COVID-19 pandemic. Unmanned payment systems further broaden our horizons for establishing stores within micro-markets centered around specific facilities that were previously inaccessible, including offices, factories, and logistics centers.
The shopping flow using an unattended payment system
Building the system by combining three elemental technologies: tracking people by camera, product recognition, and unmanned payment.
Creating a New Relationship between Customers and Corporate Advertising
Data One Corp. was established in collaboration with ITOCHU Corporation, NTT DOCOMO, INC. and CyberAgent, Inc. to develop a digital advertising distribution business and advertising agency business utilizing retailer purchasing data. Data One employs FamiPay and other services to deliver tailored advertisements that align with customers’ interests. This is achieved by harnessing approximately 31 million advertisement IDs derived from the purchasing data acquired through our daily store operations. This data is used not only to improve services but to also provide efficient marketing and branding for various manufacturers. We aim to improve customer convenience by building a new advertising business that leverages the customer base of brick-and-mortar stores while delivering more useful information to customers.
