Inspiration
Shopping at retail stores is generally terrible. It's difficult to find a staff member, and once you do they don't know your preferences and fail to personalize your shopping experience.
Shopkeeper aims to solve these problems using Gimbal beacons, Nexmo, and a store's API (in this case, Zalando).
How it works
Shopkeeper will scan for a store's Gimbal beacons, which can be strategically placed to serve as a 'virtual sales assistant' in each department of the store. After a beacon is sighted, Shopkeeper loads a helpful interface recommending items based on the department and customer's purchase history as well as allowing the user to request a staff member with the press of a button.
When the button is pressed, Nexmo is used to notify a representative.
Challenges I ran into
The internet connection made it nearly impossible to download dependencies; we had difficulties finding a phone with a high enough API level to test on; when we did, the OS got corrupted and bluetooth stopped working; None of our team had ever worked with Android before
Accomplishments that I'm proud of
We managed to get it to work (pretty much).
What I learned
Basic Android UI structure, sometimes bluetooth piggybacks off of Wifi drivers on smartphones, shopping is cool
What's next for ShopKeeper
It's scalable - the idea can be used for any physical store. It generates revenue - customers who otherwise wouldn't be helped by a staff member can receive shopping guidance. It optimizes employee resources - staff use their time much more efficiently by helping customers when they need it. It has low overhead cost - Gimbal bluetooth beacons are extremely cheap to deploy.
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