The high-tech smart shopping cart has landed in NJ, here’s where

They say it’s a grocery store game changer. While I’ve seen places where you grab one of those scanning guns on your way in that you use to scan your item as you select them, I never saw what just arrived in New Jersey.

It’s being called the Cadillac of shopping carts. It’s a high-tech smart cart that has a scanner built right in. Parts of it look like something out of “Star Wars” that even light up like a lightsaber. (I’m supposed to concentrate on unit prices when they’re making me think I could be taking down the Death Star?)

They’re called Caper Carts and the manufacturer says the basket size is larger, there’s a labor savings for the store, and for the customer there’s a an 18% faster shopping experience.

Here’s a video showing some of its features.

As you can see it has everything but leather heated seats. It scans your items as you put them in. It has a port for you to check yourself out and pay right on the cart itself. You not only don’t have to talk to a single person like a cashier if you don’t want to, you don’t even have to wait extra long at the self-checkout line.

So where in New Jersey can you try out one of these bad boys? They’re already at the ShopRite in Spotswood. Now they just arrived in Bloomfield at the ShopRite at 1409 Broad Street.

If all this high-tech is a bit much for you, no worries. The stores want you to know they still have regular old-fashioned carts available too. But admit it. You kind of want to try one.

Opinions expressed in the post above are those of New Jersey 101.5 talk show host Jeff Deminski only.

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