Technology in a JAPANESE department store

Traditionally, Japan is well known as a country which has always been strong in department stores. The main store in the Seibu Department Stores group has had the highest sales in Japan since 1980 and the group itself will probably have the largest sales this year. Technology is high on the group's priority list and in this paper, Kazuo Ido outlines its various applications. These include a two‐way television phone between the elevators and the Monitoring Centre which trapped customers can use in an emergency situation — “like that of an earthquake which occurs quite frequently,” says Mr Ido — and the “Robot Porter”, for customers who love shopping but hate to carry it around the store with them. This is a slightly abridged version of a paper read at RMDP's Retail Profitability conference at the Royal Lancaster Hotel in London in February.