RE Journals: Bots, algorithms and tech-mapped delivery routes: Ryan Companies, Kroger and the future of grocery shopping

By Dan Rafter, RE Journals

Article Excerpt: 

The COVID-19 pandemic has brought big changes to the way people shop. And one of the biggest? A growing number of consumers have turned to the Internet to buy their groceries, going online to purchase everything from milk and eggs to toothpaste, deodorant and shampoo.

Grocers have embraced this change, boosting their online ordering capabilities. But one grocer in particular, Kroger, has made an even bigger move toward automation. The grocery giant in April opened its first automated online customer fulfillment center in the Midwest.

Powered by technology from British online grocery delivery company Ocado, the facility in Monroe, Ohio, relies on artificial intelligence and robotic pickers. Ocado’s automation systems first analyze customer orders, with the bots then picking the items in the most efficient way possible. Kroger delivery people than use mapping technology to deliver these orders using the fastest routes.

Minneapolis-based Ryan Companies played a key role in bringing this fulfillment center online. The Midwest company both designed and built the customer fulfillment center in Monroe. And that’s not the end of Ryan’s involvement: Kroger has hired Ryan Companies to build five of the 10 Ocado-powered customer fulfillment centers that it is bringing online across the United States.