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Daily news and analysis about the food tech revolution

Freshub

Video: Can You Sell Things in the Smart Kitchen Without Being Annoying?

Most of us have heard the adage that the kitchen is the heart of the home. But it’s also a space that’s ripe for commerce, especially with all the new appliances, software, and services rolling out as the kitchen gets smarter.

In this video from the 2018 Smart Kitchen Summit, Richard Gunther of Digital Media Zone speaks with Iri Zohar of Freshub, Benton Richardson, of Amazon Dash, and Shawn Stover of GE Appliances about the future of in-kitchen commerce models: be that automated grocery replenishment, personalized suggestions, or shoppable recipes.

But how do you sell things to people in their kitchen in a way that, as Gunther put it, “isn’t annoying?”

Watch the full video below to find out.

Kitchen Counter Point of Sale: Analyzing In-Kitchen Commerce Models

Look out for more videos of the panels, solo talks, and fireside chats from SKS 2018! We’ll be bringing them to you hot and fresh out the (smart) kitchen over the next few weeks.

Smart Kitchen Commerce Startup Freshub Partners With TCL To Build Smart Kitchen Assistant

Smart kitchen commerce startup Freshub has inked a deal with Chinese consumer electronics giant TCL to build a smart kitchen assistant. The device, which is build using the TCL Xess mini tablet, will give consumers the ability to add items to their shopping baskets using voice commands.

From the release:

“”TCL is fully aligned with Freshub’s goal to connect grocery retailers directly to the consumer in the connected kitchen, and we are excited to make this happen in the U.S. and Europe,” said Iri Zohar, CEO of Freshub.

The deal, announced last week, is an interesting move for the Israel-based company.  The company, which has partnered with the likes of grocery commerce platform companies like NCR, is wading into an area currently dominated by Amazon. At the same time, this type of product can serve as a proof of concept for other large players in the CE and retail grocery space who are looking to build similar products. Given the rush by Amazon and Walmart to build smart commerce platforms this year, we’re likely to see a rush of new products in 2018 as grocery retailers prepare to stave off the competitive threat of larger home delivery players. In that sense, this deal positions Freshub as an alternative platform around which to build these types of kitchen commerce products.

The biggest challenge ahead for Freshub and TCL is getting consumers to buy into the idea of a kitchen assistant from someone other than Amazon, Google or Samsung. TCL doesn’t enjoy the same type of brand recognition as these larger players so they’ll need some of their grocery partners (Freshub has a partnership with Peapod) to actively co-market and even subsidize the “kitchen assistant.”

Freshub Partners With Big Data To Make Smart Kitchen Shopping Easier

Freshub is one of the companies looking to own point-of-sale solutions for the kitchen. Home replenishment services and in-home grocery shopping have been buoyed by connected appliances like Samsung’s FamilyHub fridge and voice assistant devices like Amazon Echo.

Just a few months ago, the company launched the second generation of its software platform, enabling grocery ordering using natural language interfaces such as voice and gesture recognition on appliances and devices. Now Freshub is partnering with IRI, a big data and predictive analytics company that works with large retail companies to deliver relevant consumer data and analytics solutions.

The partnership will allow Freshub to have access to enormous amounts of data about what consumers like to buy, preferences based on the types of things they already buy and predictions about what they’ll want or need next. This is similar to Amazon’s suggestion engine, with recommendations for similar things that a shopper might want after they establish a buying history. The joint press release from IRI and Freshub also indicates “the relationship also will spur development of a range of additional innovative features, such as product-level health indicators.”

IRI Retail President David Hoodis commented,

“Retail and CPG companies can more rapidly adapt to the demands of today’s connected consumers by offering effortless and efficient shopping experiences.”

Having a platform that can offer this type of “if you buy this, then you’ll like that” platform for appliance and device makers to add to their connected kitchen offerings is appealing. The real story behind connected devices in the home is what will happen to all that data and how marketers can use it to make personal recommendations for each consumer in their home, and Freshub’s partnership with IRI could give them the data chops necessary to compete with the likes of Amazon and Google.

Freshub Launches Second Generation Kitchen Commerce Platform & Hardware Partner

Freshub, a maker of a kitchen commerce platform, announced its second generation platform and its first hardware partner this week.

With Freshub 2.0, the company has created a platform for ordering groceries using natural language interfaces such as voice and gesture recognition. As part of the announcement, the company said it is working with third-party hardware makers to build Freshub 2.0 into devices, and identified XtremeMac as its first consumer device hardware partner.

The XtremeMac device is called KitchenHub, is described as “a high-end touchscreen-enabled, voice-activated music player that comes bundled with an array of kitchen applications, including grocery shopping, music playback, recipe lookup, cooking timers, weather forecasts and more.”  The two companies did not give a shipment date for the KitchenHub.

By focusing on natural user interfaces like voice, Freshub offers a potential alternative to grocers or food retailers who are wary of standardizing on Amazon’s Alexa and Dash platforms. Amazon’s own home commerce efforts seem to be slowly shifting towards Alexa and away from Dash, in part because of the runaway success of Alexa and Echo.

Freshub’s ace in the hole still seems to be its relationship with NCR, a retail point of sale Goliath, who probably sees Freshub’s technology as a necessity to fight back against Amazon’s effort to push the point of sale into the home.

Freshub also has a relationship with Gourmia, a fast growing maker of connected kitchen equipment. The relationship was announced last spring, but at this point it doesn’t look as if Gourmia has shipped any products powered by Freshub’s platforms.

You can see Freshub CEO Iri Zohar speaking about its technology and the smart kitchen commerce market with the head of Amazon Dash Daniel Rausch and Hiku CEO Rob Katcher at the first Smart Kitchen Summit below.

Food Commerce and The Smart Kitchen