AI-Based Image Recognition Technology in Grocery Retail

Image recognition technology, which is in use in many different fields, is one of the most popular developments that has been on the agenda of the retail industry for the last few years. Advances in artificial intelligence also allow the potential of image recognition technology to be unleashed. There are visual artificial intelligence services in the retail industry, especially grocery retailing, and image recognition technologies come at the top of the list. As in every field, the location and purpose of the application used, has a big impact on the results obtained. 

What is Image Recognition Technology?

Image recognition technology is used to process, analyse and understand images of products on the shelf. In order to do this, the software goes through intense learning and is trained with multiple image sets to become nearly error-free. At the end of the day, the software processes, analyses, and interprets the products in the images presented to it and creates actionable insights for retailers and CPGs.

Image Recognition Technology in Grocery Retailing

Image recognition is used in many areas, from security to marketing, from payment to customer service in grocery retail, with the technology continuously developing. At Vispera, we leverage and develop image recognition technology for the benefit of grocery retailers and brands. Here are the main features of Vispera’s image recognition technology:

• Product availability check (also known as SKU availability)
• Shelf share, on-shelf availability and display share 
• Planogram compliance
• Out-of-stock detection 
• Damaged exposure detection
• Competition analysis

How Is Technology Used In The Field Of Market Retail Inspection?

The technology keeps the shelves under constant surveillance with photos collected by field teams, retail merchandisers or shelf-top cameras. Thanks to the collected images, the software can instantly detect deficiencies in stocks and detect errors in planogram compliance.

Advantages of Image Recognition Technology

Image recognition technology provides several advantages to grocery retailing. These advantages are as follows:

• Image recognition technology saves time for the field team performing auditing activities.
• Grocery retailers and CPGs can gain accurate data and actionable insights with AI while managing the perfect grocery store.
• Al unlocks the full potential of grocery retailers’ strategies.

With these advantages, an accurate perspective is obtained, and both efficiency and reliability are increased.

In addition, Vispera makes a significant contribution to the grocery retail sector with its cutting-edge products. Tailored for grocery retail, Vispera’s IR-based products meet the needs of the industry with specific customer needs and use cases. There are two products designed by Vispera, “Storesense” and “Shelfsight”. While Storesense is a mobile image collection system, Shelfsight is an in-store fixed camera system. 

Use of Image Recognition Technology in the Field of Grocery Retail

With Vispera, stores and CPGs can either take advantage of mobile devices or shelf-top cameras to collect data to be analysed, and the rest is in the hands of Vispera’s AI-based image recognition services.