Amazon is opening its 12th high-tech convenience store Tuesday in New York. The spot will be the first of the chain to allow customers to pay with cash. The move comes with growing resistance against cashless stores, which critics say refuse to serve people who don't have bank accounts.
At other locations of the store, shoppers enter by scanning the Amazon Go app. That's still the case for customers paying with a credit card, but people paying with cash will have an "entry associate" scan them through the turnstiles (旋转栅门). Once they're finished, those shoppers will check out with an Amazon Go employee and receive a paper receipt. Cashless customers can still walk out by scanning a phone that has the Amazon Go app at the turnstiles. Customers using the Go app can exit without waiting and get a digitized receipt.
The 1,300-square-foot New York store-the first Amazon Go store on the East Coast-will offer prepared foods, such as sandwiches and salads, It will also have Amazon Meal Kits and locally made options.
Amazon says it will begin accepting cash at its other Go stores "over time." A number of retailers (零售商) and restaurants, such as Sweetgreen and Dos Toros Taqueria, are facing roadblocks to their cashless recommendations.
New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy recently signed a law banning cashless stores in that state. Philadelphia also passed a law to prohibit cashless stores earlier this month, and officials in New York City, Washington and San Francisco are considering similar moves. The federal government does not require retailers to accept cash.
"While card-only may be convenient for some businesses, it can actually be discriminatory against poor communities that don't have as much access to banks or lines of credit," said New Jersey State Senator Nellie Pou, who sponsored the state's new law. Not accepting cash could also be bad for business. Americans use it in 30% of all business deals, according to a 2017 report from the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco.
