There are few feelings that quite compete with wandering a store when you're in a hurry or you need to leave and you can't find what you came for. Sure, you can ask the staff, but what if you can't even find them? Then when you do find someone, what if they send you on a wild goose chase or don't know where it is themselves? Well, for a problem like this, there's a saying Cupertino just trademarked.
Some big box retailers like Costco or Home Depot, you walk in and you can almost instantly get lost. There's just so much stuff and all you want is one teeny tiny box of screws. Or you've been sent on a mission to purchase something unusual like blackstrap molasses. Now is that in the baking section or with the syrup in the cereal aisle? Thanksgiving Dinner all depends on you!
How easy it would be if someone created a kind of GPS for a store that could show you where things were. Well, via CNET, we learned about Aisle411, which rolls out today (and may just get lost in the iOS 4.2 madness) and wants to be your go-to shopping solution.
The app, according to its makers, hooks into grocery chains' stocking systems and can geolocate you and the stores near you. From there, you simply type (or speak) in what you want and you'll be directed to the spot in the store where the product you're seeking should be. While it can access stocking info, Aisle411 unfortunately can't access inventory (yet, we imagine), so if your grocery chain is all out of canned pumpkin, you won't know until you get there.
Still, the app sounds fairly feature-rich, including built-in coupons, a barcode scanner that hooks you up with product info, store maps, and the ability to make grocery lists on the fly or at home online, letting you sync the two (something we've taken to doing using SimpleNote). There's also a Foursquare style badge system and you can even become captain of your local grocery (for those who care). The service will initially launch in San Francisco, Chicago, St. Louis, and San Jose with more cities promised later.
While Meijer has had such a service for themselves for some time, we're wondering if most chains wouldn't rather just turn things over to a service like this, reap all the benefits, and let the software developers handle the tech end of things. We know we wouldn't be keen on junking up our phones with an app for every retailer we shop at. Still, we would like to find those drillbits...
