"Voice is dead", Hema launches experiential grocery, cast your votes with the blockchain! Also - which online mattress retailer is opening 200 stores in the USA? One guess, and it rhymes with "blasper". Listen now!

Show notes

• Phillip's wife received a package from Care/Of Vitamins and it had someone else's pills in it (!!!!)
• When new companies enter the pharmaceutical and health space, how can we trust that they are being diligent in their quality assurance?

RIP Voice Shopping?

• The Information have said only 2% of Echo users have ordered using their voices and 90% of that 2% (AKA .18%) didn't use it again.
• Are there future applications for voice in commerce, though?
• Brian theorizes there could there be in-context purchasing opportunities in audio/visual media.

Voice is still growing in popularity

• 40% of adults use voice searches each day.
• In most cases still, voice compliments screen.
• We are long way from seeing voice as its own "channel." It can compliment existing channels, though.

The problem with the voice assistants today (other than the fact that they might just be FBI listening devices with PR)

• Amazon, company with the best position for commerce releases a voice assistant. No one uses it for commerce. It has great hardware and technology. Most people use it for music. It's awful for web search, though.
• Google, the company in the best position for web search releases a voice assistant, but it lacks the commerce capability.
• Apple, the company with the best position for music, releases the worst voice assistant, and even its speaker is lackluster.

China brings innovation in the grocery business

• Hema Market is like Amazon Go, but on steroids.
• Hem Market is backed by Alibaba.
• At the cashless grocery store, every item has a barcode customers can scan to trace the product's origin, delivery, and nutritional information.
• On your way out the door, you can pay using your smartphone or visit a face scanner that links you to your Alipay account.

Smell you later, basic pencils

• In the back to school market, there are new products popping up like guided creative journals and scented pencils. These new innovations are driving significant profit over traditional options.
• This aligns with a larger pattern of creating luxury upgrades on commodity-type products. Consumers are more willing to supplement the mundane with something unique and new.
• As the economy improves, luxury purchases are increasing on low end goods.
• This could be why aspirational luxury brands are struggling.
• Phillip sites the luxury brand, whose name he could not recall, that burned all their extra stock to increase demand. IT'S BURBERRY, PHIL!

Tracking inflation with the... kale index?

• Wages have risen, but prices has not. Base prices will likely follow.
• Is there a cleaner-eating, non-GMO, certified organic, locally-owned version of the Big Mac index for our present time?

Casper is going "clicks to bricks"

• Casper is opening 200 stores in the United States.
• Mattress stores across the country are closing, what makes Casper different?
• Casper has built a recognizable brand and has a competitive price point.
• This is the result of the VC rapid-growth mentality. Now that they've saturated web sales, brick and mortar follows.
• Care/of ships wrong products
  • Voice? Ded.
  • 2% of echo users ever bought, 90% never use it again
  • ACTUAL SOURCE
  • Unnamed sources = who cares?
• Hema grocery concept store
• Blockchain voting via VOATZ - West Va.
  • Bad Idea? or WORST IDEA EVER?
• New product categories arise in back to school sales
• Casper to open 200 stores
  • Clicks to Bricks

• Couple charged with Amazon fraud scheme