On Friday, we told you that robots are here. And by “here,” we mean the grocery store around the corner. They’re scanning shelves, checking for spills, cleaning floors, making deliveries...should we keep going?

But this isn’t a full-on takeover. Grocers and the companies behind the bots are looking at how they can be a solution to staffing shortages and a relief to multitasking associates.

Helping hands

Aisle-scanning bot Tally, for example, does work that store associates can’t or don’t have time for—like digitizing product location and availability, Simbe Robotics CEO Brad Bologea told Retail Brew.

Grocery workers “wear many, many hats,” from stocking to checkout, and Bologea said that Tally allows retailers to “more optimally redeploy or refocus that labor” by having a robot do the work of identifying the problems (like missing items) that staffers need to address.

• Pointing out these action-oriented tasks can also help retailers leverage gig workers, who are becoming more common within grocers, he noted.

Caleb Hoelscher, senior technical lead at Schnucks, which deployed Tally chainwide last August, said that the bot has become “a foundational piece of store operations” by reducing out-of-stocks on shelves (and increasing sales by doing so). But the work itself is still performed by associates, he noted, with Tally becoming like “a personal assistant” to them.

On task: Brain Corporation’s scrubbing robots (which are in all of Sam’s Club’s ~600 locations) are sort of like a Go-Go-Gadget arm, said Josh Baylin, its VP of product and marketing—an extension of the worker to help “extract more operating hours out of a single person.”

• When these robots capture labor hours from humans, they’re often taking on less desirable jobs, he noted, like cleaning or moving heavy inventory.

“We’ve really got to ask ourselves, and certainly we’re asking our customers, is this really work that you want your folks doing?” Baylin told us. “Over time, I think we’ll get far more comfortable with robots taking that dirty, dull, and dangerous work away.”

Click here to keep reading about how ​​robots can give workers (and themselves) a boost.—EC

Presidents’ Day weekend is when a ton of brands go on sale…but what would a president buy at a Presidents’ Day sale?

Abraham Lincoln had his top hat, but President Joe Biden’s signature fashion statement is his favorite shades, the Ray-Ban aviator. It was another style from the brand, the Wayfarer, that then-candidate Bill Clinton donned when he played saxophone on The Arsenio Hall Show in 1992.

Oval closet: Brooks Brothers outfitted 41 of the 46 presidents for their inaugurations, but not Biden, who chose a Ralph Lauren suit and overcoat for his swearing-in. President Barack Obama and Michelle Obama, for their part, are both fans of J. Crew, with the former president famously wearing a bow tie from the brand at his first inaugural ball.

But when Obama dressed down...he got dressed down. The mockery of his dad jeans may have hit its high (or low?) point when he threw the first pitch at the 2009 MLB All-Star Game in a pair of billowy Levi’s.

• But a loose fit was exactly what President Lyndon B. Johnson was after when, as memorialized in a recording from the Oval Office, he called Joe Haggar Jr., of the Haggar Clothing Company, to order six pairs of roomier pants.
• What LBJ didn’t like about his previous, more form-fitting pairs of Haggars, he said, was that “They’re just like riding a wire fence.” (But in a bad way?)

President Donald Trump’s America First policy may not have applied to his own closet. In his 2005 book, Think Like a Billionaire, he noted that Brioni, the European brand, was his favorite when it came to suits, shirts, and ties, but that he was a fan of Hermès ties, too.

West wings: Trump’s tastes are more affordable when it comes to his favorite foods, which include the Filet-o-Fish and Big Mac from McDonald’s and the fried chicken from KFC (eaten, presumably, with a golden spork).

• He’s now mostly vegan, but President Clinton used to be a fan of the Egg McMuffin.

And those jelly beans that President Ronald Reagan famously kept a jar of in the Oval Office? Jelly Belly.—AAN

Today’s top retail reads.

Everything is commerce: The evolution of e-commerce is forging a new map for consumer-powered, tech-driven shopping. (Digital Native)

Book it: A look into why certain authors’ book covers are designed with branded aesthetics. (Eye on Design)

Onward: Luxury giant Kering is planning for a future with more menswear and no more third-party e-comm. (Business of Fashion)

At the mall, it’s where band tees are the only tees. In Retail Brew, it’s where we invite readers to weigh in on a trending retail topic.

Yeti is getting back to its roots. The drinkware company announced Thursday during an earnings call that it will end its wholesale partnership with Lowe’s.

• The two linked up in late 2019, when Yeti saw an opportunity to reach the home-improvement shopper. Now, the brand believes it has better options.

“As we have evaluated our growth areas, our focus and optimization mandate, and the current supply constraints, we ultimately believe we can be more productive, better serving our Yeti customers across our strong existing wholesale partnerships, our owned direct channels, and our growing international opportunities,” CEO Matt Reintjes said.

Air tight? Yeti’s not the first to look more critically at its wholesale approach. Sportswear giants Nike and Adidas have been upfront about their desire to wean off wholesale and lean more into DTC. Do you think it is a smart strategy? Cast your vote here.

Circling back: It turns out that more than a few Retail Brew readers were fans of Amazon’s Alexa-as-a-mind-reader ad spot during the Super Bowl. Coinbase’s commercial also got some shoutouts, with one person saying that it was “simple and on long enough to go from annoyed to ‘might as well.’”

Catch up on the Retail Brew stories you may have missed.

• Lids drops a new website for drops
• How brands can make smart moves into the metaverse
• Smell that? Scents are a key part of a store’s identity, even in Covid