Amazon closed its Fresh and Go stores. In France, 156 stores without staff run on a QR code.

A store without staff does not run on computer vision. It runs on knowing who comes in, what goes out and what is left on the shelf. Amazon removed Just Walk Out from US Amazon Fresh stores in 2024, and Api has opened 156 stores in France with no permanent staff, where customers identify with an app or QR code.

I am writing this because the industry has spent years treating two different things as synonyms: a store without staff and a store full of cameras. What has happened since 2024 suggests they are not.

What Amazon stopped doing

In April 2024 Amazon confirmed it would remove Just Walk Out, its checkout-free system, from Amazon Fresh supermarkets. It was pulled as existing stores were remodelled and did not go into new ones. Amazon leaned on the Dash Cart instead, a trolley that scanned items as the shopper added them; the newer versions carried fewer cameras and asked the customer to hold the product up to a reader (Bloomberg, via Fortune).

Amazon gave no reasons in that report. The press pointed to the entry gates, which put some shoppers off, and to digital receipts that arrived minutes or hours after payment. The NRF Europe 2026 round-up by TimeSkipper puts it down mostly to cost. My reading is a different one: in a large supermarket, its cost and its friction outweighed its promise.

On 27 January 2026 Amazon announced it was closing all its Amazon Fresh and Amazon Go stores in the US, 72 in total (57 Fresh and 15 Go), most of them on 1 February and some to become Whole Foods (Newsweek). Amazon said “we haven’t yet created a truly distinctive customer experience with the right economic model needed for large-scale expansion” (CBS News): that is about its stores, not the technology, which according to Amazon still runs in more than 360 third-party locations across five countries.

What Api does instead

Api, a company from the Charente region, has opened 156 self-service stores since late 2022, spread across 21 French departments, according to Le Journal des Entreprises (1 July 2026). They go into villages of at least 700 inhabitants and open 126 hours a week. These are not 24-hour stores.

According to the TimeSkipper NRF Europe 2026 summary, they are units of about 40 m² with close to 700 products and no permanent staff. Customers identify themselves with an app or a QR code, one manager looks after several stores and, in its words, there is no need to multiply cameras or computer-vision technology.

What its customers say: the problem is the shelf

Api surveyed 1,400 customers across 82 municipalities. This is the company’s own data and should be read as such. 94.5% report no negative effect. Among the problems that do come up, the most cited is the empty shelf (40%), ahead of theft or incivility (15%). The company also says it is not yet profitable.

This is what interests me most. A store without staff is forgiven for not watching the customer. It is not forgiven for not having what the customer came for. The operating challenge of these stores is not at the door, it is in knowing what is inside.

No barriers, someone nearby: Colruyt

This week, on 12 October, RetailDetail reported that the Belgian chain Colruyt now has 150 stores with self-checkout (454 lanes) and plans to add 51 more by the end of the year. Its self-checkout zones have no exit gates and rely on customer trust, with a staff member always on hand. It is not a store without staff. I mention it because it points the same way: less barrier between the customer and the product.

What this means for uNobo Connect

We designed uNobo Connect as the operating system of automated 24h retail. The machine confirms the sale when it dispenses, the customer pays with their phone and age verification is handled in software, with integrations such as Veriff or Bouncer Digital depending on the market. No sale depends on a camera interpreting what the customer picked up. We have already explained why it is not an app.

The lesson from Api for us is in operations: restocking has to be decided by what the machine records, not by what the customer complains about. That is the criterion we design that layer around.

What this does not prove

Api’s figures come from the company and its own survey. Amazon does not blame Just Walk Out for closing Fresh and Go, and the idea that it does not scale to a supermarket is my reading, not a data point. Colruyt is a staffed store. And our network operates today in a single market, Spain: I do not extrapolate what happens in France or Belgium to any other country.

uRetail S.L. has run the network’s pioneer market in Spain for four years, under the Flappers brand. Portugal, Italy, France and Germany are the priority markets for the next Country Partner, and the rest of Europe remains equally open, with no partner assigned.

If you operate or want to lead autonomous retail in one of those markets, write to info@bonoboservices.com or use the form at bonoboservices.com.

Román Suárez, Founder of Bonobo Services OÜ

Cover: Amazon Fresh in Logan Circle (Washington, D.C.) with Just Walk Out, on its opening day in 2021. Photo: Ted Eytan, CC BY-SA 2.0 (cropped).