Analytics are the equivalent of a computer following you around the store, watching what you look at, how long you look at it, what you pick up, what you pull out of your cart and put back...

I’ve never in my life gotten message from the grocery store saying, “Hey, we saw you were looking at grapefruit. Here are some other citrus fruits we think you might like.”

I’ve never in my life had a store send me a message offering to sell me all the items I abandon in my cart on my last trip.

There is certainly data brick and mortar are looking at and it is often intrusive and creepy. Still, they weren’t doing this a few decades ago and they were fine. They’re pointing at online stores and saying “But it’s the only way we can survive!” It’s almost bizarre to point back at the more expensive, often first-party controlled, less accurate solutions of brick and mortars and say, “But they’re doing it too!”

(This problem is compounded when this data is given freely to a third party who now has much more data than even the individual stores or websites.)

All this adds no benefit to me as a customer. Lower prices are not a benefit if I’m also being psychologically influenced to spend those savings and more on something else.

Online or offline, I don’t care. Stop doing it. It’s creepy and unethical. It’s a waste of resources that could go towards giving me better products or a better experience. It’s the equivalent of cops asking for back doors in encryption schemes because it makes their jobs easier. If businesses can’t find a way to stop doing it themselves than I think maybe we need some regulation.

I hate to break it to you, but that's already happening too. Many retailers are using NFC/RFID + door scanners combined with CCTV and computer vision to track exactly these sorts of things, as well as patterns of flow. Retail store layout is a critical part of product placement optimization and is used to create particular flows through the store. The most blatant example of store layout controlling flow is how an IKEA is designed, however these things are used very heavily in grocery and mixed retail spaces (Walmart, Target).

This part at least isn't really true. Since grocery stores have been around, there have been people working full time in effectively analytics - observing customer behavior, modifying products/layouts/UX, doing a/b testings etc. Digitizing everything gives new tools and approaches but overall the game hasn't really changed.

Every part of your experience in an grocery store has been analyzed and tweaked since at least the 60s.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/kashmirhill/2012/02/16/how-targ...

I disagree, and I would prefer the entirety of my phrasing be quoted:

> Brick and mortar retailers manage to reach an acceptable level of business without watching exactly how every customer looks at shelves by just selling things people want or need [...]

I am referring to the enormous number of independent retailers, not just the small number of ultra-wealthy retail giants. Note I was careful to say "acceptable level of business" rather than "absolutely maximised profits", because I don't necessarily agree that it is a requirement that all people make as much money as they can possibly manage.

If you were to make the argument that monitoring customers' actions is a means to make more money, I wouldn't disagree. I just don't think that all businesses will fail miserably without it.

> Do you have experience with managing brick and mortar stores?

Yes. They're small shops that serve a well-understood need for the local population and produce a sustainable income for everyone involved. No need to do much more than that for me.