European Retailers Use Smartphone Technologies To Personalize Shopping

French retailer Carrefour is testing strip light technology to track shoppers with smartphones and point them to tailored special offers. It’s the latest European initiative that uses smartphones to inform and guide shoppers – with their permission – to personalized promotions. Marks and Spencer in Great Britain sends text message ads to shoppers in or near its stores. (Three-fourths of British retailers use technologies, including facial recognition software, to track customers in stores, for both security purposes and personalized shopping.) German retailers use the smartphone app Shopkick to reward consumers with points when they visit stores and scan products. But older shoppers aren’t particularly in love with the advances. “We are being tracked to death,” said a 50-year-old Carrefour customer. “I guess I'm old school, but I want to keep my privacy."