Coop Denmark

Coop Denmark is the largest grocery retailer in Denmark, operating 1,150 stores and 36,000 staff across its retail chains and subsidiary stores.

Coop’s business aims are very clear: boost efficiency, continue to differentiate from the competition, maintain their position as a leading retailer and responsible employer and drive customer loyalty and engagement. Implementing fun-to-use consumer and employee apps with first-rate scanning was integral to achieving these aims.

Goal 1: give customers scan-and-go shopping in a mobile app

Central to Coop’s customer engagement strategy was the launch of a mobile app featuring self-scanning so customers could browse stores, scan products with their smartphones, add items to their basket, then pay directly in the app using a card or accrued loyalty bonuses. Other features like shopping lists, tracking loyalty points, recipes, personal discounts, and competitions, add more value for more customers.

“We’re constantly identifying new ways to boost engagement and strengthen customer loyalty,” said Simon Færch, Head of Digital Product Innovation and Digital Customer Experience, Coop Denmark. “Mobile self-scanning creates richer, more frictionless in-store experiences, while improving our understanding of members’ shopping behaviour to create deeper, more personalized relationships.”

Goal 2: add flexibility and speed to store operations with mobile scanning apps

Coop identified an opportunity to boost efficiency and employee satisfaction by moving manual tasks like order picking, rescan, loyalty scanning and markdowns onto scanning-enabled mobile apps on smartphones. Giving employees a great user experience and a choice of devices capable of enterprise-grade scanning was essential to making life easier.

“We’ve seen a retention rate of 55% for customers using the app and self-scanning feature since deploying Scandit. They use the app on average once every two days, engaging with us and taking advantage of its features even when they aren’t scanning and shopping. The fast, reliable scanning makes shopping frictionless and customers happy. We aim to triple the self-scanning adoption rate amongst members by the end of the financial year.”

Best-in-class scanning performance was a must

Scanning had to be ultra-fast and reliable with no first-time friction or mis-scans and work on all customers’ device types. Coop compared the performance of dedicated scanners with open source scanning software against smartphones powered with Scandit software.

Impressed with the speed and accuracy of Scandit’s Barcode Scanner SDK, even in difficult conditions such as low lighting, in shadows and glare, at long distances, awkward angles, and with damaged barcodes, Coop appointed Scandit. (The SDK supports over 20,000 mobile device types.)

Integrating scanning into the customer and employee apps was quick and simple, taking just four months from pilot to rollout. Scandit’s SDK was well received by Coop’s AGILE app development teams.

No waiting, no cash, no paper

The Scandit-powered self-checkout app was successfully launched across 1,150 stores in Denmark and Greenland in 2019. Coop were laser-focused on customer experience: eliminating first-time friction and showing customers “what’s in it for me?” Customers simply enter the store, open the app on any camera-enabled device, shop by scanning barcodes and complete purchases on the spot with a digital receipt.

Shelf management, price verification and order picking on a mobile app

Coop deployed the Scandit-powered app to 2,000 employees on Samsung smartphones. The lower cost, compared to dedicated scanners, means more employees have devices, rather than having to share. Workers speed through tasks like mark down and in-store picking with the mobile app.

“We wanted to give our associates more flexibility, choice and a better user experience with smartphone scanning.”

Results: faster store operations, lower costs and employees enjoy the app

• Employees complete tasks like order picking, price markdowns, scanning loyalty cards and checking inventory much quicker.
• Shelf management and automated price verification is done before the products even get to checkout – no need for manual corrections.
• Order picking of on-line orders is done in seconds.
• The number of active Scandit-powered devices used by employees tripled within the first year.

Results: app engages 250,000 customers everyday with 55% retention rate

• Over 1.6 million downloads and up to 250,000 people use the app daily for an average of four minutes.
• App used by customers already on over 1,160 different device models, including iOS and Android.
• Data captured is used by Coop to develop personalized offers, promotions and discounts.
• The app is equally popular with older as well as younger customers because they can see receipts and do budgeting within the app.
• No ‘shrinkage’ as a result of the self-scanning app.

MatrixScan and Augmented Reality (AR)

Coop is now testing how they can incorporate additional Scandit technology including Scandit’s MatrixScan and AR to make further workflow efficiencies like stock counting and item adjustment.

The advanced functionality captures multiple barcodes with a single scan, then uses AR overlays to display real-time product or store information on device screens to deliver greater productivity and a superior customer service.