ePrice labels on shop shelves

[Wobbly John]

While shopping in Aldi, with mrs W this morning we noticed that one of the price labels on the cheese shelves was flashing between red & white. After a few seconds it went black for a second or two, and then white with the price and details of the product.
Up to then, we hadn’t noticed that the labels were electronic, and we hadn’t realised ePrice labels were a thing! 
Presumably they are blue tooth/wifi, and be updated at will? They also look like they have a little camera lens on them! 
Anybody else noticed shelf labels that aren’t really bits of card?
I am really tempted to nick one to send to Big Clive for analysis… 

[Cudzoziemiec]

Haven't noticed them. Also haven't bought cheese for a while. Could this be connected?

[Wobbly John]

It was all the price labels throughout the store, not just cheese. Once we had spotted the flashing one we were on the lookout 👀

[RichForrest]

Saw them on a tiktok (or some other app) video some time back.
Never knew until then.

[Auntie Helen]

Our Aldi was renovated a few weeks ago and we also have thes3 - but not on the movable B804Bgh in the middle, just the static shelves. Technology!

[De Sisti]

Noticed them in an Intermarché supermarket store in Pont-a-Mousson a few weeks ago.

[robgul]

Those "radio controlled" shelf pricing things have been in the Auchan (and IIRC Carrefour) shops in France for years.

[quixoticgeek]

Been around for years. They use e-ink displays, so they consume no power while not updating. Most have a little barcode to identify the display to the system, so you can scan the tag, then set the contents.

Seeing as supermarkets by them in the 10's of thousands, the unit price has come down a lot, and now you can get the display unit on ali express for a couple of euro. Various maker friends have used these displays for things like a panel with live departure info for the local tram stop. Or a dashboard type display for their home, showing which windows are open, how much power they are using, temperature, etc...

Great bits of tech. Highly recommend.

J

[Pickled Onion]

Great bits of tech. Highly recommend.

J

Yes, they're great. We have e-ink desk badges at work. If I log in to a desk in another office, after a minute or so the badge flashes and updates with my name & desk number. I've been meaning to get a couple for an Arduino project or similar but not sure what to use them for yet.

[Mr Larrington]

I was in the Aldi in Alton IL the other day and thankfully no such new-fangled nonse cropped up there.  Though I wish they’d sell milk in smaller containers.

[Kim]

Presumably they are blue tooth/wifi, and be updated at will? They also look like they have a little camera lens on them! 

Possibly a simple photodiode sensor?  This stuff isn't new, and at least some of them were using TV remote style IR signals to update the data, as a way to keep the costs down.  Presumably there's either a network of emitters in the ceiling, or someone wanders round with a handheld unit once a day.  (I vaguely recall some standard whereby LED room lighting could be modulated at high frequency to convey this type of information, no idea if that ever got off the ground.)

Otherwise, I'd have thought a Zigbee-type protocol would be the way to go.

[arabella]

As a user of local shops for local people, I haven't come across these yet, so I wonder how this fits with "invitation to treat" :
- you take item off shelf with price of £before/item/100g/etc
- price is updated
- you get to the till and find the price is now £after/item/100g/etc
- if you're lucky you notice and can decide whether you want to offer £after or not for your purchase
- if not you then wonder why your carefully calculated total is incorrect

[Cudzoziemiec]

The future, of course, is to combine this with facial recognition and offer individually tailored pricing.

[Paul H]

My local Aldi can't even get the basics right, like putting the price label under the goods it refers too. Not so bad when it's obviously wrong, when it's slightly wrong, like same product in a different size, it's easy to be caught out.  The reduced items moved to the end of the shelf are even more of a mystery, 30% or even 50% off, with no idea what the original price was.