According to The Telegraph, Sainsbury’s supermarkets in the UK will soon provide shopping carts with built-in iPad docks. The docks are intended to make it easier to customers to use their iPads while shopping.
While many shoppers will no doubt find this a wonderful convenience (iPad as a shopping list, yes!), I wonder somewhat about the cost-effectiveness of this move. The iPad holder will be able to told back and forth, and will even feature an on-board battery to charge your iPad and speakers to pump sound through.
Additionally, the new shopping cards are equipped with a sensor that tells you if you’re getting too close to a person or object and beeps to warn you to pay attention.
Personally, while I can see the convenience of this, I wouldn’t want to shop in a store where every customer was distracted by their iPad instead of paying attention to where they are going and what they are buying.