Why Autonomous Floor Cleaners Are the Smart Investment for Higher ROI and Greater Efficiency
Nearly 80% of consumers consider cleanliness one of their top three priorities when choosing a grocery store, according to the Canadian Federation of Independent Grocers.
Maintaining safe and spotless floors is challenging in high-traffic supermarket environments, especially amid ongoing labor challenges.
Building on its success in cleaning warehouses, shopping malls, and airport spaces, Avidbots caught the attention of a major retail grocery chain. The retailer acquired 256 Neo robots, and through valuable insights gained from this partnership, Avidbots developed Kas — a robot specifically designed to handle the unique challenges grocers face when looking into autonomous scrubbers. This innovation paves the way for further expansion in the retail sector.
In an interview with Progressive Grocer, Faizan Sheikh, co-founder and Head of Customer Success at Avidbots, discussed why now is the ideal time for grocers to automate their floor cleaning.
What makes Kas uniquely suited for offering grocers a worry-free, safe and efficient solution to floor cleaning?
Faizan Sheikh: We built our robots from the ground up for a seamless experience, bringing hardware and software all under one roof.
Kas can accommodate even the tightest spaces while navigating display changes and other obstacles that competitors with pre-determined cleaning paths can’t.
If necessary, Avidbots offers the benefit of the industry’s first “Human-in-the-loop” Remote Monitoring/Assistance. Avidbots employees are even able to help ‘unstuck’ a robot remotely should the need arise. We have comprehensive service and support plans ensuring optimal performance.
We have a platform to monitor cleaning. A portal at your fingertips measures everything from square footage cleaning productivity metrics to water consumption information.
Grocers can enjoy a cleaner workspace without sacrificing more time and resources so they can best serve their customers.
Dovetailing with that, what are the advantages of automating floor cleaning — and how fast can the move payoff?
FS: There are two times when companies think about their floor cleaning — when building brand new stores or when their manual machines need to be replaced. Typically, grocers can see dozens of machines fail at any given time during the year.
We want people to know when that time arises — or at any point for that matter — that autonomous cleaning with Kas can pay off from day one.
If you automate with leasing — no money down with a small monthly installment — your monthly payment will be much less than an employee operating a manual machine. Most customers can get a positive return on investment in month one when they lease. With manual cleaning, the investment is not just in employees; manual machines are expensive.
If you buy a robot and don’t lease, your payback is in under a year for most customers. It costs a lot less than manual cleaning.
No matter the size or number of stores you operate, if you have two hours of cleaning per day you will have a fantastic ROI.
How does Kas enhance the shopping experience?
FS: Customer service has two key aspects: cleaning quality and overall experience. Feedback shows that our autonomous cleaning outperforms manual methods — delivering consistent, thorough results without cutting corners that sometimes happens with manual.
We often hear that our robots are friendly and attractive. We’ve even received a prestigious Good Design award, which recognizes innovative and cutting-edge product designs.
Non-threatening and approachable, Kas is well-received by shoppers — so much so that many retailers operate our robots during the day to encourage positive interactions.
Ready to put automation to work in your space?
Learn more at avidbots.com