PRE2018 1 Group3

0LAUK0 Group 3

Dirk Heldens 0969145

Geert van Wordragen 1024503

Islam Lakehal 1203310

Nosa Dielingen 1023912

Tristan de Waard 0996117

Problem Statement

Food prices have been steadily growing since 2006 [BRON]. Because of this, the highly competitive supermarkets have had to increase prices tremendously. For example, butter and margarine prices have gone up with a staggering 54.9% over the past 10 years [BRON]. It is important to give supermarkets more chance to compete and increase their customer satisfaction. A solution might be found by streamlining, increasing the efficiency and economizing the state-of-the-art supermarket. Since self check-out services already are cost efficient, enhance customer satisfaction and are already becoming more and more abundant [BRON], an emphasis will be laid on the role of a store clerk in the supermarket. This research proposes the design of a robot store-clerk that either assists the human store clerk in inconvenient tasks, or acts as a replacement for the store clerk. Apart from the expected positive economic effects for supermarket enterprises, the negative and positive effects on users and society will be investigated thoroughly as well. To investigate the user’s needs, two surveys will be conducted: one targeting the general consumer another targeting store clerks. To demonstrate the functions of a store clerk robot a prototype will be made.