Amazon’s latest grocery store concept opens, with high-tech carts

Amazon.com Inc on Thursday said it is opening a supermarket in Los Angeles with shopping carts that let customers skip checkout lines, as the e-commerce company builds out its offline presence.

The market, in the Woodland Hills neighborhood, is called the Amazon Fresh grocery store. It is the first location to let customers in – by invitation only – out of seven that Amazon has confirmed for Southern California and greater Chicago. The Woodland Hills site will open to the wider public in coming weeks, Amazon said.

The world’s largest online retailer has experimented with physical stores in recent years to capture more consumer spending, particularly in groceries. It has more than 20 cashier-less shops with grab-and-go food for office workers and over 500 stores in the Whole Foods Market chain it acquired in 2017.