Walmart: Giant Pickup Towers Now Available in Select Stores (Grab Your Items w/ Less Hassle)
Photo from Business Insider
If you’ve been leery of placing Walmart pick up orders due to the hassle of going into the store, walking all the way to the back and standing in a long line, here is some great news!
Photo from Business Insider
Walmart is rolling out self-service kiosks called Pickup Towers that will actually retrieve your online order for you – these machines are currently located in 20 stores with plans to add them to 80 more stores across the country over the next few months. These massive 16 feet tall structures are located near each store entrance for convenience. To retrieve your pickup order, just scan a barcode on your purchase receipt, a door on the machine opens, and the items appear on a conveyer belt. Click here for more information.
Walmart is also testing new approaches in two recently opened supercenters in Tomball, Texas, and Lake Nona, Florida. These stores offer Scan & Go technology (just grab a Scan & Go wand when you enter the store and then use the Scan & Go fast pass checkout lane), Ordering Technology (just place your order, go shopping and then come back to quickly pick it up) and Next-Gen Call Buttons that allow you to press a Wi-Fi-connected call button and which alert associates wearing GPS-enabled devices that assistance is needed. See more HERE.
More humans out of work. This scares me.
Someone still has to bring out your stuff. At least at my walmart. I checked at the kiosk and someone brought my stuff.
Humans still involved–someone has to load the item(s) into the machine when you check in. Human jobs are changing though, we all need tech skills.
Have you picked up an online order from Walmart the employees don’t seem to excited to even have that for a job. Walmart could put their skills to better use.
The ladies who work at the online pickup at my store are amazing! They’re so bubbly and pleasant. The offer to check out my other items if I have any and usually give me a handwritten thank you note & piece of candy. Sadly I’ve emailed Wal-Mart several times to compliment tgese employees for or their outstanding customer service but I’ve never received a relpy.
Try writing to the store manager. I used to work at a walmart and I got called into the office one day, and they showed me a letter a customer had written about me.
I completely agree with April. They seem bothered to have to go retrieve your merchandise.
It varies but I’ve waited 20 min to pick up items. Honestly I stopped doing online orders because I would wait longer than walking to the actual isle and checkout at a register. My husband worked as a truck driver picking up recycle cardboard boxes for Wal-Mart’s and mentioned most of the employees were rude because they were replaced every couple of months.
My experiences as well. I have never ever been able to order online and pick up the item with anything less than a 20 minute wait. Sometimes I have even had to make additional trips after being notified by email that the item is ready for pickup when it was not. Once they told me my order had been canceled after the 3rd trip to pick up my order! Typically, I have gone to the pickup area and had as many as 20 employees walk past me without helping me. I have also had to leave the pickup area to find an employee who of course does not work in that department who gets on the loud speaker to request help, which is usually delayed in coming. Overall terrible system. Overall terrible customer service. Even if the deal is great it is not worth it to me to order online with Walmart anymore. Or to even shop in the store unless I have no other option. Sorry to say, but if robots take over the jobs of some Walmart employees that may not be such a bad thing.
I’m not making excuses for them they should always be cheerful, but a lot pf times people fet put in the pickup department just as a temporary position and aren’r properly trained, and even the ones whoare trained have other jobs to preform, lastly if an employee inthe actual picking of the merchandise doesn’t do their job correctly, then it is very frustration for the pickup person to try and find that item. (I have worked all ends of the spectrum, and if every one does theur job it runs smoothly, but one kink throws everything off)
I concur. Every time I try to pick up an order, I just end up waiting and waiting. Usually, someone gets pulled from another job and seems annoyed with the bother. I have stopped ordering for pickup if I can help it. I would welcome not having to wait for a person to bother to help me.
Who built the machines? Who fixes them? Who loads the merchandise into them? Think outside of the box 😉
I worked for walmart for 8 yrs in customer service. Quit a couple months ago b/c frankly it just isn’t a good company to work for. Loading would be done by the workers but any machine maintanence is done by an outside company. There would definitely be less man power with the introduction of these machines don’t fool yourself otherwise.
No one said this conversation was just about jobs at Walmart. Again, think outside of the (big) box.
Apparently you still don’t get my point or the OP’s. However I will get off “the box” you are so very fond of and not waste my breath.
She said think outside of the box, she was not accusing you of being on the soapbox. Also, Andrea’s right, the original poster said that humans will be out of work. She said nothing about Walmart specifically. Sorry, I think you’re the one that took this one the wrong way.
Walmart is actually doing its part to reverse the trend of humans out of work. Right now, I can walk into the store, pick something off the shelf, and go through self check out. I can shop without any human interaction. Instead, I get the convenience of ordering online, having a Walmart employee pick it up off the shelf, have another employee catalog it and prep it for receiving, and possibly have another hand it to me.
Just an FYI the SAME person that retrieves it off the shelf would be the same person that catalogs it for pick up. I have run that counter during Christmas time along with layaway. Trust me I know how it works. You might get another person that does the pick up for you when you show up but that would be due to shift changes or break times. Each dept is designated a set amount of hrs for all employees, why do you think customers complain so much about lack of cashiers?
Sometimes human interaction hurts business…I know I avoid stores with rude lazy employees
In my experience, the fewer Walmart employees you have to deal, the faster, easier, and more pleasant the transaction. Most of the time, no one’s even there (and they don’t always answer pages). Last time I picked up something, a guy had been waiting for an employee for a while then gave up and did his shopping. I stood there waiting while many Walmart employees walked by or had conversations and ignored me. I finally flagged down and employee in front of customer service who was chatting with another employee. She told me the site-to-store employees sometimes go on break without telling anyone.
It’s called advancement.
Yeah advancement at what cost. This is one example of a frightening trend. You may not feel it until you know someone who was replaced by automation.
Walmart never has many humans working there anyway. Most of the time its the manager on duty that gets the pick up orders anyway. Maybe 2 people would be out of work if this goes live at all walmarts
I just tried the grocery pickup and I loved it. Totally check that out if it’s available in your area.
good to know, ours got it a few months ago but I haven’t tried it. I like that all you do is pull up to a back door and call them and they bring it out….I just don’t shop much for groceries at Walmart because Aldis always has better prices but I might try it for the things they don’t carry. Thanks!
Awesome! Thanks for sharing!
I love grocery pickup but it’s so popular in my area that the time slots get filled up so fast! Like I needed groceries this morning but the earliest pickup time is tomorrow evening 😕
I LOVE the grocery pick up service, too. My kids hate to shop but they give me no complaints with this because it’s so fast. The couple times I’ve used it, the personal “shopper” who picks the items for me has done a great job on even produce! I’ve gotten some of the most beautiful bananas this way. The only bummer is no coupons, and the receipt doesn’t work with ibotta. Walmart savings catcher works, though.
I will be thrilled when our store gets this. I order from them all of the time and yet I HATE walking in and waiting for the guy to get it for me….they are slower than molasses and they don’t really care because they don’t have any where to go, they are there for 8 hrs (or whatever) and yet I have other errands, so PLEASE get my stuff quicker is what I always think! I am much faster than they’d be because I am motivated to move on and get other things done…haha!
Have you tried the app? You check in when you get to the store, and they grab your order before you get to the counter. I just did it this am. No waiting for me 🙂
ours has the option to do it. But they don’t go get it until you are there. I’ve done it multiple times and have had to wait like 10 minutes for things. I guess people now complain because they have a timer they have to hit and write down how long each person took.
Yeah, I use the app and “check in” at the light before I pull into the store….and they STILL have me check in at the store and then they take so long getting it. There are only 2 guys at my store that do it and each one is slower than the other! 😉 They drive me crazy so I can never go running in and get it, it is at least 10 mins just to pick things up. And I always find it odd they don’t give me a receipt (though I know I have an online one) because I hold onto the stuff and shop if I have to and always feel weird w/o a receipt. Also I had to laugh…last time I picked up things, I had one big box, 3 small boxes, a tiny box and 3 plastic bag/envelopes and the guys just looks at me after I signed off on them and says “do you want them all in bags or do you want to carry them out just like this? (I wanted to see him carry them out…it took him 3 trips to the back room and he dropped the plastic bag ones twice…LOL!)
We have this–the first time I used it I couldn’t stop telling everyone about it! So quick and eeeeeasy!! And located at entrance. Love it!!!!
How cool! Thanks for the feedback Julie! Good to know how convenient it has been for you!
These are awesome! We have a Walmart 5 minutes away and another 20 minutes away. I will order from the farther Walmart just because of the tower. I ordered shoes and after punching in a few bits of info and scanning the order barcode, the machine produced my order. The only reason I would need a worker to retrieve my order is if it is too big for the tower. It’s not like it’s going to put anyone out of work…there’s never anyone at the order pickup counter at the Walmart closest to my house.
The last few times I have done BOPUS with Walmart, I got emails saying my items were ready when in fact the store never pulled them. I ended up having to shop for them myself- which kind of defeats the point of this service. I don’t know how much these will improve their service….
The store I work at was actually the first store to get it since we are one of rhe few official test stores. We have had ours for over a year now. The way it works is small enough items that you order online come into our store thru Fed ex or UPS and our pick up guys go and get it and load it into the machine. We actually keep someone there at all times. They also go and pick your order frpm the shelves. Just scan the notification you got on your phone and boom it gets your order or notifies the employee. It saves time on having to wait for the most part.
Cool! Thanks so much for the helpful feedback Amanda!
It will be awhile before these come near me. Not a big enough town. I often do not buy at Walmart for pick up because of the horrendous experiences with it in the past. Consistently, it takes 10-15 minutes just for an associate to show up at the Pick up desk. One time, after all that, they said the item was cancelled but they hadn’t sent an email stating such until after I left the store.
My Walmart is even more amazing, you don’t have to get out of your car!! It’s a total game changer. You can do groceries or just ANY online order. You drive to the pickup area, sign in on a kiosk, it tells you the bay to drive up to and they bring it to you! If you’re in a rush you can check in on the app and it’ll be ready by the time you pull up.
SWEET! 🙂
I think my walmart is finally doing some type of online pick up they are remodeling the whole sode of it with pick up signes pointing toward that are super excited to see what it is when they are done hopefully carside pick up
We just got one of these. I love it. Scan your order barcode and your package magically appears! There are locked cabinets for oversized items that an employee has to unlock and retrieve for you.
That’s great Beth! Thanks for your review!
With all the recent talk about Artificial Intelligence, it seems that things are happening very fast. I remember watching Terminator 2 as a kid and the future seemed so remote. I guess we had to see this coming. My hubby was talking to his Skyvi app, who was a very mean robot, and at some point she said “you won’t think it’s funny when robots will take over the world”. Scary indeed
It’s pretty cool. It’s like the Jetsons. Your order shoots out along the conveyor belt. When I was watching my order do its thing, there were a few people standing around to watch it work… We were all like “Wow. So cool”. I was in and out of there in a couple of minutes. (Supercenter in Glenpool/Sapulpa, OK)
I would love my store to get these closed to the entrance, I just walking the entire store to get to the pick up area! They would probably get more business from me this way 🙂
I love this…this would make me shop at Walmart more…I avoid this place because its a hassle to pick up orders
When my daughter was newborn and would scream every time she was put down, I bought a swing online for store pickup so I could just race in and grab it. When I got there, it took almost 15 minutes to get anyone to help me and then the box he brought out looked like it fell off a truck and got run over! It wasn’t even closed back up all the way when they re-taped it! I refused to take one in that condition because I didn’t want to get home and find out I was missing parts (or that it was broken). When I objected and said I wanted one that wasn’t all beat up, I was told I could go find a new one on the shelf! Horrible customer service.
The ladies at mine who know me by name now since I get so many pick up goodies will appreciate this!! 🤣
This is awesome. It my store it is near the door when you come in and they have nice chairs for you to sit and wait as they get your order and bring it to you.
Anything to get me in and out of that Hell hole quickly is a glorious thing. Love the Walmart prices but just can’t stand to be in the store or deal with parking. I hope to see this pickup kiosk in more stores in the near future! 🙂
I’ve given up on ordering at Walmart. Pickup is a nightmare there. 20 minutes to get a human at the desk, then 20 minutes to find your order. if they find it. Often they cannot even though you have the email and order number. Employees are rude and clueless. Next step, the only thing that would bring me back to ordering from them, is actual robots handling all of this. It would be a quantum leap in customer service.
Over by me it just takes a while for them to come out. Never a line just no one there. Can’t really complain though. It looks like the pick up is next to the stockroom and I can only imagine how big that is….
Mine has pick up where they have the grocery pick up, so I don’t even have to get out of my car!!! Love it!!
I just went to my local Walmart and the tower is already up. I’m excited about this new feature. Usually when I place an on line order to be picked up at the store I have to wait FOREVER for someone to come and help.
Happy to hear this is now available in your store Jackie! Thanks for sharing! 🙂
I’m not sure if our store will ever get one of these. They used to take forever to pick up an order but the last several times it took me longer to walk all the way to the back then to get my order. They have been on top of it. Hope it stays that way.