Salvatempo App - Coop Alleanza 3.0

We worked with Coop Alleanza 3.0, the largest consumer cooperative in Europe with over 2.7 million members, to create the POC (Proof of Concept) of the Salvatempo App, an innovative solution that integrates the physical and digital shopping experience. Designed to offer greater autonomy, efficiency and sustainability, the app allows members to shop independently, using their smartphone to scan and pay for products directly, without going through the till.

The project, which intertwines the physical and digital worlds, was approached by applying the Service Design methodology, characterised by an initial discovery phase. This involved mapping the user's journey across all touchpoints involved in the shopping experience and a conceptualisation phase in which we designed and tested potential solutions.

Strategic and operational benefits

By adopting a user-centred approach and an integrated ecosystem vision, this initiative has brought significant results in terms of innovation, sustainability and improved member experience:

• Integration in a complex ecosystem: The app harmonises with existing systems and touchpoints, ensuring consistency between the physical and digital worlds.
• Improvement of the Customer Experience: The purchasing path has been redesigned to be simpler, more intuitive and personalised, giving members more autonomy and control when shopping.
• Operational efficiency: The use of the Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) model has reduced the need for proprietary hardware devices, leading to a significant decrease in maintenance and management costs.
• Effective collaboration: Co-ordination between the different company departments and technology providers enabled complex challenges to be faced and overcome, while maintaining an approach aligned with Coop's strategic objectives.
• Sustainability: The dematerialisation of membership cards and receipts has reduced the environmental impact, contributing to Coop's social responsibility goals.

Background: the advantages of contactless retail

TWC's 'Forging a New Future in Convenience Retail (2020)' research showed that the Covid-19 pandemic has generated an increase in demand for self-scan checkouts and contactless payments: two-thirds of people would prefer solutions that allow them to scan products and pay for them themselves.

The need for a secure, contactless retail experience that complies with regulations has led large-scale retailers to accelerate the introduction of self-scanning and scan-and-go solutions with the aim of safeguarding their customers and employees. These options not only facilitate the physical distancing imposed by the pandemic, but also allow customers to use their smartphones to choose, acquire information and purchase products.
In addition, self-scanning and mobile scan-and-go solutions had already been well-received by some major supermarket chains and retailers, and welcomed by consumers who want to save time while shopping.

In this scenario, Coop Alleanza 3.0 has set itself the goal of offering its customers an innovative shopping experience that uses technology to speed up shopping and make shops safer. After the success of 'Salvatempo', which used hand-held scanners and dedicated checkout kiosks, Coop Alleanza 3.0 decided to extend this solution to mobile devices, focusing on an app that would allow the entire shopping experience, from shopping cart to payment, to be managed in total autonomy and security.

Through POC, the aim was to test the validity of a digital service that would allow the member to shop independently, from shopping cart to payment, without any intermediation or assistance. With a view to dematerialisation, the aim is also to test an initial approach to digitising both membership card and receipt.

The path from Scan&Go to the Salvatempo App

At the Proof of Concept (POC) stage, the project was developed under the name 'Scan&Go', a term that emphasised the innovation of the service and its ability to integrate the physical and digital worlds. This name was used for the testing and validation of the app in pilot shops, where the aim was to ensure that members could shop independently using their smartphones.

Scan&Go is an app designed to allow Coop Alleanza member customers to independently scan products by scanning the barcode on the packaging and adding them to the virtual shopping cart. Thanks to this solution, the customer can always view an up-to-date summary of products purchased, monitor the total amount spent and calculate real-time savings through promotions and discounts.

These features, combined with the ability to pay directly through the app using the membership card or other digital payment methods, allows members to skip the checkout lines and streamline the entire purchasing process. During the validation phase, the project team worked closely with Coop to ensure that every aspect of the experience was in line with customer expectations.

With its market launch, the product was renamed the 'Salvatempo App'. This choice reflects the desire to strengthen the link with the Salvatempo service already known to Coop members, positioning the product as a natural evolution that is recognisable and consistent with the Coop Alleanza 3.0 ecosystem.

Discovery: hopping in both the digital and physical worlds

In order to understand the ecosystem in which the use of the Salvatempo App would be positioned, we started by mapping the user's customer journey with the aim of identifying areas for improvement and any discrepancies between the physical and digital experience.

This activity included shop visits to analyse user flows, the study of shop plans and the strategic positioning of QR codes and information materials. The active participation of shop managers and employees made it possible to identify constraints related to the physical world, such as poor network coverage.
To solve this problem, a dedicated Wi-Fi network was installed in the pilot shops, simplifying the use of the app and ensuring a smooth experience.

In this initial phase, reconstructing the overall experience perceived by the user served to contextualise the in-app purchase flow within a clearly defined physical space. This provided a solid foundation on which to design a well-orchestrated and consistent experience across the various physical and digital touchpoints involved.

Conceptualisation: from ecosystem to product

On the basis of the information gathered, we began designing the Salvatempo App. To do this we started with an overview, focusing on all the existing digital environments already known to users, such as the Coop Alleanza 3.0 website and official app, with the aim of maintaining uniformity and consistency in terms of flows and interaction patterns. In addition to the core functionality of product scanning, we have provided other complementary services to enhance and streamline the experience, including:

• a digital wallet for managing payment methods, including the membership card and credit or debit cards belonging to the major payment circuits;
• a spending area, which allows users to keep track of all their transactions in one place, and provides the option to view and download dematerialised receipts.

The design phase also involved our intervention in one of the physical touchpoints inside the shops: the self-service checkout. Our job was to integrate the functionality of the Salvatempo App with the checkout payment flow, which until then only involved the transfer of the shopping cart from the app.

Visual identity

From the point of view of visual language, the Coop Alleanza 3.0 digital ecosystem speaks to its users with a shared lexicon organised into touch points. For Salvatempo App, a consistent mood was chosen to pave the way for a possible integration with the Coop app.
We therefore put visual consistency first in order to optimise a possible integration flow and to strengthen the ecosystem concept.

The user who switches from one app to another, from consulting the product range to filling the trolley and paying for the groceries, feels as if they are changing rooms yet are still within the same house – Coop Alleanza 3.0.

Iterate to simplify

The Salvatempo App is a digital product for members who want to do their shopping in total autonomy, complementing the Salvatempo terminal, which offers a similar but less technologically advanced solution. The project was characterised by continuous iterations, including laboratory tests and field inspections. Interviews conducted with users in the pilot shops highlighted, for example, the importance of intuitive navigation and clear instructions for using the app, leading to incremental design changes.

With these insights, the team optimised the payment flow and made the Wi-Fi connection process more intuitive, improving the overall experience. These improvements set the stage for the future roll-out of the app, with the aim of extending its adoption to new outlets and enriching it with additional features, such as the ability to further customise member promotions.

This opens up a scenario in which, in the near future, Coop Alleanza 3.0 members will be accompanied throughout the entire 'shopping experience', which starts at home with leaflet browsing, continues with the in-store experience in total autonomy and ends with contactless payment and the visualisation of the dematerialised receipt in the app.

The phygital era

In this project, the biggest challenge was to make the digital world coexist with the physical world. Quoting Cegid, a French company specialising in digital retail solutions, we have entered a new era – the phygital era – where our role is to increasingly integrate physical and digital channels, designing innovative, effective and memorable experiences.

Thinking of Service Design as the design of experiences that impact multiple channels, contexts and products, the challenge of the Salvatempo App allowed us to contribute to defining how Coop members can shop independently within the Coop Alleanza 3.0 ecosystem.
This digital solution not only improves the shopping experience for Coop members, but also strengthens Coop Alleanza 3.0's role as a pioneer in phygital retail, anticipating the needs of an ever-evolving sector.