Self serve grocery scanners

I saw these at a grocery store in Provincetown, MA, while visiting. Using your grocery card, you check out one of the scanners from the wall display, and grab some empty grocery sacks. As you shop, you use the scanner gun to scan each item (the big yellow button) as you put it in the bag. When you are done, you put the scanner in the checkout machine and pay.

Scanner in the cart holster

While I’m sure the novelty of laser-shooting your groceries (pew! pew!) would wear off, what I liked about this system was the ability to see a running total on the scanner. (Shown in the photo as $1.00) It also shows sale items via ads displayed on the scanner, and I have a feeling I’d be susceptible to that as well. The scanner with its few buttons is easy to learn, and offers the ability to scroll your items in the list and remove them. I wasn’t playing close enough attention to see if the checkout system verified weight to reduce theft, but I’m assuming it did.

I’d use it.