Shopping is hard in general, but especially so when the list gets bigger. You end up making more circles through the store and it's hard for the human brain to validate that the 20 things in my cart are the same as the 20 items in the list. As far as error prone-ness, this is on the level of matrix multiplication ;)
There's a use case for Google Glass right there. Amazon already has the product recognition software problem fairly nailed. The person doing order fulfilment simply holds the product at eye level before placing it in the card, and it deletes from the list until there's nothing left.
Step two: integrate with inventory management so Glass tells the human where to go. Step three, replace the human with a robot and the store with the local distribution warehouse.
> it's hard for the human brain to validate that the 20 things in my cart are the same as the 20 items in the list
In this age of smart-everything, there's no help for that?
Seems strange.
Further, to make things even less difficulty, I'd think it'd be rather straight-forward to map out the select stores they go to in the extremely small set of markets they serve. Certainly considering this is their profession, no?
Some stores change their layouts around occasionally, mostly when new product comes in that needs space. I've seen at larger chains where nearly the entire grocery department switches overnight. I don't know if Trader Joes or Whole Foods does this, but that's something to take into consideration if you're mapping products.
