There are things that technology simply couldn’t emulate…

Remember squeezing the perfect avocado or spotting the week’s best deals at the local store? Grocery shopping is increasingly being replaced by the tap-and-go ease of grocery apps. Sure, apps like Coupang are a lifesaver, I can’t imagine a life without it now that I am hooked into their rocket delivery service, but there are benefits lost in the translations while we are getting use to the digital aisles. What we gained from convenience; we seem to have lost the experience that made it special.

Innovation shouldn’t exist to completely replace the enjoyment we get from our lives. It should be there to amplify it, to magnify the good aspects while mitigating the negatives.

I guess my point is: A true innovation starts by understanding the essence of our experience with the activities we enjoy in our lives.

I believe real innovation doesn’t erase the good stuff from our lives – it makes it even better.

Imagine apps that help us find the freshest produce, stumble upon hidden deals, and rediscover the joy of grocery shopping. That’s where true progress lies in understanding what makes activities like shopping fun and enhancing it, not replacing it.

The fun of picking the freshest looking cabbage or the choosing the milk with the longest expiration date is what made grocery shopping a unique experience. You felt as if you are taking the best quality product that the market offers, and you also get to see adjacent products that are neatly displayed in the shelves to see what great offers are on sale today.

That experience is long done when you are clicking and strolling through your vegetable shopping through an app.

What’s worse is that sometimes, the goods that you’ve ordered comes in an ‘un-fresh’ manner a poor quality that you just cannot accept. For example, an egg that is cracked out of the dozen, or the basil looking too damp and is far away from giving a freshness vibe. Even with a 100% return policy, it makes you wonder if you could have made a difference if you had a bit more motivation to move your lazy body to a physical store.

Yes, as much as I believe in a hyper-connected world, there are remanences in our lives that opt for the physical experience. Grocery shopping is one experience that cannot be 100% replaced with an app or with a virtual medium. Sometimes you must feel the store and the produces that are displayed physically to know that you are purchasing a fresh ingredient for you and your family.

Technology should exist to enhance the fun and joy of bustling and hunting through the local supermarket, squeezing the ripest avocados, and comparing milk carton expiration dates.

So, if anything I see is that the grocery store experience will be the next innovation frontier.

People will want an alternative to the current brick and mortar checkout methods of your nearest whole foods but will want to keep the experience of hunting for the freshest and the cheapest deals.

Below images are generates with MSFT co-pilot on the possibilities of how we can upgrade the user experience we get from grocery shopping with connected technology.