Creepy and Obnoxious Changes Coming to Connecticut Shoprite Stores

If you've ever shopped at a Connecticut Stop & Shop store, you've probably seen 'Marty' the robot wandering the aisles. If I'm in a good mood, I'll take a moment to say a few words to Marty. If I'm having an off day, I quietly direct a couple of swear words at the robot and tell him to get the F&#! out of my way.

If you're a Shop Rite customer, Marty the Robot's distant cousin and arch enemy, Tally the Robot, will be given a test ride at select Connecticut Shop Rite locations. I thought these buckets of bolts and circuits were programmed to spot spillage in the grocery aisles and spy on customers by reading their minds, but I was totally off base.

Wouldn't you agree that Tally appears more modernized and intelligent than Marty? According to robotics247.com, Wakefern Food Corp. has decided to expand its deployment of these Simbe's Tally robots to additional Shoprite stores.

These AI "geniuses" can't bag groceries or stock the shelves, so why are Shoprite and Stop & Shop spending thousands of dollars on these robots? According to the bigwigs at Wakefern Food Corp, they are the ideal shelf-intelligence solution, which means they prioritize aisle-by-aisle inventory worklists to the store associates. In corporate speak, Simbe Robotics described Tally as "The Most Advanced Autonomous Inventory Robot on The Market."

In layman's terms, chief executive officer of Simbe Robotics, Brad Bogolea told Hearst Connecticut Media that Tally cruises grocery store aisles approximately three times a day utilizing high-definition computer vision technology. This tech collects data on whether products are in stock, priced correctly, and in the right place on the shelves.