In Shanghai, a prototype of a new 24-hour convenience store (2017) | Hacker News Reader

In Shanghai, a prototype of a new 24-hour convenience store (2017)

fastcompany.com

62 pointstintor19 comments

There are several startups in China doing that. BingoBox has a very similar setup.[1] Wheels, too. Bodega had a similar concept for the US, but at vending machine size, not shipping container size. The optimum size for these things isn't clear yet. It does make possible a convenience store too small to justify a full time employee.

Amazon will probably combine these with Amazon lockers and take over the industry in the US. If the convenience store doesn't have it, you'll be able to order anything Amazon stocks delivered to a locker.

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hYN3gozk4fo

Oddly, Brazil doesn't have 24-hour convenience stores[1]. Labor is very cheap and there are plenty of 24-hour gasoline stations, restaurants, bars, and pharmacies. But if you want a large bag of nuts or microwave popcorn or a banana at midnight in Sao Paulo, in an urban area of 12,000,000 people, you won't find it. (Well, unless you drive a long way to one of the few 24-hour hypermarkets, but that's not convenience.)

I can't think of any business or cultural reason why it doesn't exist there. Maybe it's chicken-and-egg -- the public desire for convenience stores and the availability of lots of convenience stores -- have to co-evolve.

[1] http://brazilsense.com/index.php?title=Common_in_the_USA_and...

I don't know anything about Brazil, but off the top of my head, perhaps security or theft is a concern for convenience store owners? Presumably holding a lot of cash from sales late at night is risky.

I guess is cultural, maybe people dont need microwave popcorn or a banana at midnight!

Having grown up in a rather small city and moved to bigger cities later on, I found it kind of funny how people go almost religously to the 7eleven to buy late night nuts and a can of coke (or something else). When I lived in Japan even sad... you have convenience stores everywhere, and people just go there because they get trapped in a habbit of buying a "melon bread" and a "vitamin drink" on the way back home daily fully replacing a real dinner

I think convenience stores create a need rather than solving something en many cases... they just sell junk food that make people addicted to come back again and again to get those flavors...

The food sold in Japanese convinience stores is head and shoulders above those of most countries though: you can get bento boxes, salads, onigiri rice balls, basic sushi, etc. Not exactly gourmet fare, and there's junk if you want that too, but way less than in the average US or European convenience store.

I’m here in Brazil (Recife) for Carnival and I’ve noticed a lack of retail in general. Way less food options, general stores than I expected

”The biggest costs to have a store are the place itself to rent in a central city–it’s ultra-expensive–and then staff is really expensive, and we’re removing both of these at the same time”

Isn’t parking for long hours already about as expensive as renting a store and/or parking commercial vehicles to run a shop illegal in Shanghai? If not, I would find it fair if the government would tax people for taking up that much parking space for long hours. It also is likely they will, or all parking space in city centers would be taken over by vendors.

The title is misleading. The store is not self-driving:

The system is also designed to restock itself automatically. In a city, one Moby could self-drive to a warehouse to replenish itself while another takes its place (the current model can be controlled remotely or driven by a human; the designers are still finalizing the autonomous technology, and it’s not yet legal for it to drive itself on Chinese roads).

That entire title seems unsalvageable, so we replaced it with the first part of the first sentence, in keeping with the HN guideline to change the title if it's misleading or linkbait.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

AKA a vending machine on wheels.

* A vending machine the size of a small convenience store, on wheels

Have you seen the vending machines in Japan?

No I have not. Do they have a similar form factor?

In Michigan I could see this being quite successful in rural towns, quite a few lack a convenience store and might be a fifteen mile drive or longer from a full supermarket.

I am doubtful this would work in inner city Detroit at all.

I have only skimmed the article but I'm confident it's riddled with catches.

I bet it's not actually driving itself through traffic on public roads and it isn't actually managed by AI.

The key line is "When autonomous vehicles are allowed on roads". There's no actual self-driving store out on the streets.

I could see someone like a Postmates making an investment in building one of these types of products

Hm, reminds me of Bodega.

Cyberpunk

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