Starbucks retires North American AI inventory system after 9 months
Technology
Starbucks has decided to drop its new AI-powered inventory tracking, about nine months after launching it in North America.
The tech, which relied on tablets, cameras, and LIDAR to scan shelves for milk cartons and syrups, kept messing up: miscounting items and mixing up products.
Automated counting retired, manual counts resumed
Turns out, the AI struggled to tell similar products apart, like confusing oat milk with almond milk, and couldn't handle everyday challenges like changes in lighting or packaging.
Starbucks sent out an internal company newsletter saying, "Starting today, Automated Counting will be retired," and inventory checks are going back to manual counting for now.
Sometimes, human eyes just do the job better.