Hello. This is the CoopDigital newsletter.
At the Co-op AGM last weekend, Mike Bracken committed to being radically transparent with our thinking, prototypes and progress. So we’re making public this fortnightly email newsletter, which gathers digital news that’s interesting and relevant for the Co-op. We hope you enjoy reading it. You can send us feedback at [email protected].
Helping businesses get digital
Amazon selling food / possible local retail futures
In the US, Amazon is going to sell own-brand snacks, nappies and detergents. In the UK, it will partner with Morrisons to sell fresh and perishable foods. High-street retail trends are often framed as “online shopping is killing the high street”, which leaves out a lot of interesting detail. Obviously, shopping is changing. The vertical unbundling of high street retail continues: online takes a significant percentage of marketing/merchandising and purchasing spend, with their fulfillment/despatch moving to Yodel, Hermes and others, and delivery going to the home or for collection locally, for example to our Hermes and Amazon collection points in store (pdf file). How might food/high street retail and cornershops change in future? Perhaps we’ll see more floorspace devoted to local “warehousing” of goods you’ve already bought, and the Co-op would be strongly positioned to explore this further. Shopping that’s little and often, relevant to me, collecting my goods on the way home, closer to me.
Contactless payments grew to £1.5bn monthly in March 2016
Contactless “touch” payments (previous story here) with cards and mobile phones have reached £1.5bn in monthly value, and now make up 1 in 7 card payments. They’re growing primarily because they offer speed and convenience. And for older shoppers, avoiding having to tap numbers into a fiddly PIN keypad can be a significant benefit.
IKEA is selling solar panels again
IKEA is partnering with Solarcentury to sell solar panels. They say that the typical UK home could halve its electricity bill, saving £357/year (even after the government cutting the “feed in tariff” subsidy by 65% in Feb 2016). US research found that neighbours are more likely to install solar panels if there are already panels on roofs nearby - the IKEA sales channel may offer a similar “social proof”: 43m people visited stores (pdf file) in UK and Ireland in 2012.
AO.com has signed up with Relex supply chain cloud service for forecasting and product lifecycle management decisions, and likes the “reduced risk… no additional fees”.
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Data and trust
Mobile phone and public wifi providers track and sell the location data of most UK citizens
93% of UK citizens have mobile phones. Mobile phone and wifi network companies sell location and other data about those phones - but few of us know that it’s happening. That approach to user data doesn’t sit right with the Co-op - as Mike Bracken said in his AGM speech, “we’re committing to a data relationship that’s unambiguously clear and transparent”. The Open Rights Group has good research on the problem, and the Opt Me Out campaign shows how to opt out of data collection.
How technology hijacks your mind and wastes your time
Interesting read on behavioural design that takes advantage of our psychological vulnerabilities: limited menus, variable social rewards, interruptions, automated social tagging, raised barriers to exit, and other user interface tricks. Most of these are designed to increase activity and time spent by users. They’re ultimately wasteful of the user’s time: questionable practice. The counter argument might be that these techniques are the digital equivalent of long-established and accepted merchandising practices of placing of milk, bread and pharmacies at the back of the supermarket to draw shoppers in.
2012 LinkedIn hack affected 117m logins
LinkedIn was hacked in 2012 - and it now looks as if 117m sets of usernames and passwords were stolen. There have been many data breaches in the last few years, and as users our response should be to use password managers and multi-factor authentication, rather than just a jaded ¯\_(ツ)_/¯. It should also remind organisations to consider what personal data they actually need, to be visibly accountable with customer and member data, and to store, manage and destroy it securely.
Technology will reduce car insurance costs by $20bn?
SwissRe reckons that telematic systems and safety technology will result in car insurance costs dropping by $20bn in 5 years. The longer-term question is what insurance will look like if tech companies like Uber, Google and perhaps Apple are successful in remaking personal transport with self-driving cars and services that replace ownership. As Geico owner Warren Buffett said, “if there are no accidents, then no need for insurance”. (Elsewhere in car news, Apple invested $1bn in Didi Kuaidi, a Chinese Uber, and Toyota, VW and GM have all made investments or partnerships with ride-sharing marketplaces.)
Timpson is to take over drycleaning at Morrisons and add key cutting etc in 100+ stores. (Previously: Timpson’s identity shop.)
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Digital membership
Making life more liveable for those in the last phases of life
Doteveryone is a charity working on technology for social good, “at scale, for the future, for everyone”. Their current project on end of life experience is fascinating: it explores how people interact with the NHS and related services, and how to make specialised end of life services more visible and accessible to patients. Doteveryone’s prototypes will look at connecting people more effectively, collaborative patient-centred records, and visible “tokens” to signal that more care, time or kindness might be appropriate. Obvious relevance for Co-op Funeralcare, and perhaps opportunities.
Becoming an e-Resident of Estonia
Journalist Rory Cellan-Jones: “I've just acquired a whole new identity. It comes in the form of a plastic card with a chip in it, and it means that I am now a resident of Estonia. Or rather an e-resident, because this card is a symbol of Estonia's bold ambition - to export its expertise in digital identity to the wider world.” (Co-op’s Tom Loosemore points out that by contrast GOV.UK’s Verify service doesn’t collect your biometric data and store it in a single, centralised system.)
Crowdfunding as loyalty scheme
Digital challenger bank Tandem raised £1m in 20 minutes, the second UK bank after Mondo to crowdfund successfully in under an hour. More important than the money raised is the PR value of a successful crowdfunding campaign. It also creates a good number of loyal customers.
More on new banks and fintech: Telefonica’s O2 banking will launch in Germany with technology from Fidor, a decent overview of forthcoming branchless, digital-first UK banks, and Aviva invests “multi millions” in Founders Fund to scale fintech startups.
How Boots went rogue - good long read about how a key part of UK’s national healthcare infrastructure was taken private and lost sight of its values.
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Thanks for reading. If you want to find out more about CoopDigital follow us @CoopDigital on Twitter and read the CoopDigital Blog.