Starting today, Franklin customers can order from the millions of items online and select the pickup option. When the items arrive at the store, Walmart employees load the 16-foot-tall vending machine with the order, which customers can retrieve by scanning a bar code sent to their smart phones.
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Middletown was the first Ohio city to take on a tower in September. Since then, Walmart stores in Fairfield Twp., Holland, Steubenville, Bryan, Athens, Zanesville, and Franklin have debuted the towers.
“Very simply put, you walk in, you have a code. You walk up to the machine, enter your information and it finds your packages. You just grab it out of the machine and walk out,” said Walmart store manager Lorie Fischesser.
Walmart has 38 stores located in the greater Dayton area, according to the company’s store locator.
“The Pickup Tower pilot phase has been so successful Walmart is expanding it to additional locations across the country – and we’re proud to bring it to Franklin,” Fischesser said. “This technology is designed to give time back to our Franklin customers with a new shopping experience.
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In recent months, Walmart has announced a number of new initiatives to attract and keep shoppers. It’s new personal shopping service called JetBlack allows customers to order products via text message for $50 a month.
Just last month, Walmart also announced it was buying a controlling stake in India’s largest retailer. Walmart purchased a 77 percent stake in India’s Flipkart for $16 billion, making it the discount chain’s largest acquisition to date.
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