Where in the store is Carmen San Diego?

I was perusing the aisles of a rather large local store, i.e. Wal-Wart, recently; looking for a rather obscure bit of merchandise when an idea came to me. Wouldn't it be nice if the store could tell you where everything is? Now unfortunately stores are currently unable to talk, which leaves only the workers within the store to assist us. This can be somewhat problematic because the workers are often as lost and confused as we are. This is explain in Franz Smith's theory of really big stores which states that the size of the store is inversely proportional to a store employee's willingness and ability to assist shoppers. It should be noted that willingness and ability are variables and not fixed within a set ratio, however; per the law, both desires can't be high at the same time, while it is possible for both to be low and in some extreme cases to both equal zero. Unfortunately for me Wal-Mart is very much effected by this malady, it being a large store. I endeavored therefore to find a way to circumvent this natural barrier by appealing directly to the store for help. I had time to ponder all of this because my wanderings about were unfortunately in vain. I never did find what I was looking for, but as with most futile quest, I came away learning something that I hadn't set out to find. This of course begs the question that if the quest really was futile, would I have been able to come away with something that is useful? This is something else to ponder, but at a later date. For now I'll return to the discussion at hand.

I think it would be nice if stores would create a digital map of their floors and as they place inventory on the floor have it automatically tell the map where the item was placed. I think this could be done with a few tweaks to current inventory practices. We already have bar codes on everything, and products are already scanned into databases in order to keep track of what's where. I'm just proposing an additional layer. Once this inventory map of the store is completed, it should be automatically updated every time a worker scans a new product onto the floor. Now at this stage, I've created extra work for the employees without actually helping the consumers or the store. So far this plan would only seem to help depress the "willingness to help" variable within the equation. However, if my full plan comes to fruition, Franz's law will no longer be applicable, though we will need to continue to consider the ramifications of these changes in relation to Thompson's laws of checkout line dynamics, but that's for another time.

Now, to give the store its voice! In order to do this the store's inventory floor map will have to be accessible and searchable. I believe these technologies already exist, but I don't now what they are or where to find them. My solution to this, like most things is to Google it, or just turn directly to Google for help. I think the most convenient method would be something that would allow someone to pick up their web enabled cell phone or PDA (no not that PDA! The data assistant kind.), pull up the store's plan and do a search for what they're looking for. Imagine if you were in Wal-Mart looking for say, multi-colored toothpicks, and you couldn't find them. You pull out your phone/PDA and load the store map. Then you do a Google Local Store Map search and it tells you they're on aisle seventy-two and gives you a picture of the store plan with a dot showing you where on the aisle it is, plus which side. Think of the convenience! We could expand the whole Google Maps engine to the local store level! Instead of street view, we could have aisle view. We could use GPS tracking to show where you are in the store. You could even enter your shopping list ahead of time and have your phone alert you if you passed something so that you don't have to go back for it. You could even use the map to optimize your route ahead of time. Think of the time you'll save if you use the real time traffic update info to reroute around jams and slow moving traffic. I think the applications for this kind of technology are limitless! Of course, we'll have to implement security measures in order to keep this technology out of the hands of terrorists, but I think we're up to the challenge. The risks are worth the rewards that we stand to reap if we're successful in deploying these new techniques.