Only half of retail managers are satisfied with their current automation and robotics initiatives, revealing that they show cautious optimism toward the strategy, according to a report from wearable barcode scanner vendor ProGlove.
A mere 6.3% of respondents are “very satisfied” with their current automation initiatives, while 44.2% state they are “somewhat satisfied,” and almost 1 in 5 (19.3%) respondents indicated dissatisfaction, ProGlove found in its “Leadership Insights for Retail Warehouse Management” report, based on a survey of over 1,000 retail management professionals.
The results highlight that there is plenty of room for growth and optimization in the automation space, the German company said. Additional findings show the hurdles involved in adopting automation: 15.6% of leaders said that integrating automation technology remains a challenge, while 14.6% said integrating mobile commerce platforms is a struggle.
"Automation presents a complex landscape for retailers," Stefan Lampa, CEO of ProGlove, said in a release. "While it holds potential for efficiency, our research underscores the critical role of human-machine collaboration. Retailers seek a synergy that leverages technology to empower, not replace, the human workforce."
In fact, the most popular investment area for using automation to achieve productivity gains was through human augmentation, with more than a quarter (25.3%) selecting “human-machine collaboration” as a key target area. Almost as many respondents highlighted the need for new software (e.g. ERP, WMS, BI, MDM), followed by automation and robotics at 17%.
Against that background, retail leaders project a conservative timeline for those automation investments to pay off. Just 11.5% believe they will see returns within the next two years, 36.5% expect the benefits to surpass the costs in two to five years, 26.6% are looking to a five to ten-year horizon, and 8.6% are preparing for a decade or more.
