Would you be comfortable with a Walmart employee wandering into your home and restocking your fridge? What if you could watch on as they did it? The retail giant is at least looking to test out this possibly unnecessary concept through a new partnership with smart home security company August.
The idea of coming home from work to a fully-stocked fridge and pantry does sound nice, but a lot of people find not having strangers in their home nice too. In any case, Walmart is hoping that the advanced home monitoring technology from August will provide enough comfort and security for the residents of Silicon Valley taking part in the upcoming fridge/pantry delivery trial.
The service begins with the customer placing an order on Walmart's website. When the delivery person arrives and the smart doorbell goes unanswered, they can then infiltrate the residence by entering a one-time passcode into the August Smart Keypad, which is authorized beforehand by the customer.
As soon as the doorbell is rung the homeowner receives a smartphone notification informing them that the delivery is taking place. Form there, they can watch on from their phone via an integrated security camera system as the delivery person meanders around the home, assumedly not making off with the TV or any expensive jewelry.
So could such a thing become commonplace? Certainly not straight away, with Walmart conceding as much in its press release. But technology can have a way making the uncomfortable comfortable pretty quickly if it provides some extra convenience.
You can check out the promo video below.
Source: Walmart
