Kristin Popp Talks Robotics and the Secrets Behind Woodman's Success

Hello, everyone.

This is Omnitalk Retail.

I'm Chris Walton.

And I'm Ann Mazinga.

And we are coming to you live from grocery shop from the fusion group's booth, booth number a two 10.

Come on by.

We'll be here all week, the next couple days, recording tons and tons of interviews.

And up first today, I am excited to introduce our first guest at grocery shop, Kristin Pop, the executive vice president of Woodman's food markets.

Kristen, welcome to Omnitalk.

Thank you, Chris.

Thanks for having me.

I'm excited to be here.

It's great to have you.

We've been.

We've been trying to make this happen for a while.

Right.

This has been in the works for, like, almost four or five months, and now we're here.

It's great.

Well, Kristen, let's start by getting a little bit of your background and then tell the listeners who might not know about Woodman's a little bit about the operation, because it's pretty unique, right?

Sure.

Yeah.

And absolutely.

So like you said, Kristen Patton, the executive vice president for Woodman's food markets, I've actually been with the organization now for about 27 years, so, learned a lot.

I've been through the HR side, the accounting side, and the operations side, and so now I'm done basically responsible for all things and just keep, you know, keep things moving along.

What do you like about the organization?

You've been there for a while.

Like, what's kept you hanging on?

I mean, I know it sounds cliche, but obviously the people.

Yeah.

You know, both our, both our consumer and our team members, I just.

I love the opportunity to learn from them, grow with them, you know, interact with them, and it's fantastic.

And what's really unique about the Woodman's operation, like, dive into that a little bit for some of the audience.

Yeah, absolutely.

So we're a different format than I think most would realize.

And actually, I've had a couple conversations with some people here about what our format is.

So we're about a 235,000 square foot average store.

Wow, that's pretty big.

I mean, it's a good size on average.

Yes, it's big.

And we operate one format, so we don't have a smaller format, but we sell only groceries, so we aren't operating.

We aren't offering soft lines, electronics, not your clothing.

We have your standard departments, and our model is biggest selection at the best value we can bring to our customers.

So lots of items to pick from.

I always, you know, it's interesting to me when we're in the stores and I hear, I've never seen this much cheese or I've never seen this much x, y, or z.

You know, everybody has their thing that they go to the store and look for in our stores.

You can find whatever it is in that aisle that you need.

Are you, like, job well done?

When you hear people say that?

That's gotta be great.

I've never seen so much cheese.

That's awesome.

All right, so this is your.

I know this.

Cause we've talked in the past, but this is your first time at grocery shop as well, right?

It is.

What brought you here?

Why do you wanna try this out?

Why?

Is this your maiden grocery shop voyage?

So, actually, a couple things.

I had the opportunity to connect with the grocery shop team.

Wonderful team.

Love talking to them.

And they gave me the opportunity to attend.

Just check it out from a couple different perspectives.

Our marketing director has been here for several years, and so when I talked to him about the opportunity, he's like, absolutely.

You gotta come.

It's a wonderful event.

You're gonna love it.

Come check it out.

So, well, in addition to Woodman's being one of the largest grocery store boxes that I think I've ever heard.

Right.

We also.

We know you because you are, I think, one of the most technologically advanced retailers that we've talked to and continue to follow.

What would you say are kind of the technologies that Woodman's is focused on right now, that one you're most proud of, and two, have delivered the best Roi for you?

Because that's kind of the theme of this conference here right now, is paying.

Off some of these technology investments.

Absolutely.

And we are an innovative company.

You are 100% sure we have the.

Opportunity to do that, just being the independent that we are and employee owned company, too.

So we try and be at the forefront of a lot of the different technologies that come out.

I think one of the biggest ones right now that I talk about a lot is our robot program.

So, actually, our partners are here with that program, badger technologies, and we've worked with them for several years, but we've really built that out in a lot of different ways.

And we have a team member on our team that's very passionate about it.

And so we're always looking at opportunities and how we can utilize the information out of there to become innovative with them and more efficient and effective at what we're doing.

And I think that's been a great partnership.

What did you start to do with the robots when you first rolled them out.

And what is it now doing for you in the store?

I'm always curious because it's like, all these technologies we've been talking about, Chris, for so long, it's like, now they're building on them.

So cool.

And Woodman's was one of the first people in the water on robotics, quite honestly.

Yeah.

And I remember, I actually, I think I interviewed that gentleman on your team about four or five.

You guys have had it for like, four or five years.

Right, as well, so.

Yeah, that's a great question, Anne.

Yeah, it is a great question.

Because I don't know if I remember why we originally brought them on.

We've grown them.

Many reasons.

Different ways.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I think, you know, originally, it was scanning our shelves to look at the opportunities that we see, whether it's through the set pictures, you know, but now we can do price verification.

Right.

We can look at our out of stocks with them.

Our pricing team loves them because they lay out the map being such large stores.

Yeah.

Now they get a more effective way to run through the stores and do their work because it's leading them through the aisles and the path that they need to go in.

Right.

Well, and that's funny that you said that, too, because, you know, in a lot of ways, and I'm sure, I'm guessing you guys feel the same way, because a lot of the grocers we talked to that have deployed robotics, they.

They basically are of the opinion, like, they would never take it out of their store.

Like, it's just that integral a part of their operations.

Now, would you say the same thing?

Absolutely.

And I think, you know, we did a rollout of them.

We didn't deploy them in all of our stores at the same times.

The same time, which I think was effective.

But we had stores calling, when do I get mine?

When do I get mine?

Because they were hearing how effective they were and how they were helping people do their job and just be more efficient at it.

Right.

Yeah.

And helps, you know, allocate that payroll, too, so that they can do the things in the jobs that they want to do across the chain.

I imagine this gotta be key.

It allows them to do different things and be a little bit more proactive on some of their work versus just trying to play catch up all of.

The time, especially in a 235,000.

Yeah.

Right.

I imagine there's a lot of work to do.

Yeah, right.

Footprint.

Yeah, there's a big footprint.

We can make some robots to help out on that floor walk.

We can make it more efficient in how they walk.

Right.

All right.

So I think Ann and I would lose our journalist card if we didn't ask you this next question.

There's been a lot of hubbub in the industry about generative AI.

How at all are you and your role at Woodman's evaluating the application of that technology?

So that's a good question.

I wish my marketing director was here with me right now because he is itching to use AI.

That's what we hear a lot.

Marketing for sure.

Yeah.

Right.

And we certainly partner with different organizations and software programs that use AI on their end, and we get the results of that.

I think we're interested in it.

We just haven't dove in yet.

And I think just trying to understand what is the best use of it.

How do we use it effectively and safely, too.

Right.

Because you hear, and it can be very overwhelming and you hear a lot of the things that can scare you.

And so just being smart about it, but it's definitely something that we're looking into.

And now, Kristen, as you think about Genai being one of the things going into the rest of this year and into 2025, what are you excited about?

What are you excited to look around the floor here to check out, to potentially test in Woodman's in the coming months?

Oh, gosh.

When I look around the floor, there's so much to look.

This is like the first hour that the exhibit hall has been open, too.

So it's like.

It's like.

Oh, my gosh.

It's like a kid in the candy store.

Exactly.

Exactly.

So one thing I would be amiss if I didn't mention we had kind of been in a holding pattern on growth, just rebuilding from the labor challenges that everybody saw.

So we've done a lot of work to rebuild that, and we're back in a growth pattern.

And we are actually looking to open a new store next year.

So it's under construction right now.

Where is it?

It's in Racine.

Congratulations.

Thank you.

So I'm excited about that.

I'm excited to look around and see what opportunities there.

I think this, just looking at this format and the show itself will be a good challenge for me to kind of look at what opportunities are out there, what's a good fit for us, and how do we effectively bring it back and talk about it for possible use.

Yeah.

Wow.

That's a great way to approach the show, just to stay curious and take it all in.

That's what we always recommend to everyone as well.

So, well, Kristen, thank you so much for being with us again.

Kristen pop of Woodman's we are going to be here all week long.

Thanks to the fusion group for supporting our work here at the conference.

And until next time.

And when we're going to come back with the Sam's club CEO.

So stick around for that and be careful out there.