self-service market intelligence

Market Intelligence

Here is a compilation of Research and Insights from TIG The Industry Group as curated by Craig Allan Keefner

Financial App Analysis

Directories

Segments and Companies

  • C-Stores – Has Anything Changed in Last 12 Months
  • Beyond Self-Checkout: What Walmart Patents Reveal About the Store of the Future
  • McDonald’s Sept 2026 Next — Published September 23, 2026, it directly says Restaurant > NEXT includes “simplifying operations, modernizing restaurant design, and deploying GenAI enabled ArchIQ at scale” and that People > NEXT is intended to deliver a higher level of hospitality. It also states the $8.5 billion through 2036, $5 billion through 2030, ~250 basis points of efficiency improvement, and ~$100,000 annual cash-flow benefit per average U.S. restaurant https://lnkd.in/gCZVb55d
  • Quick look at corporate McDonald’s Sept 2026 NEXT release — McDonald’s new “NEXT” strategy is especially relevant to self-service because it frames restaurant technology not as isolated automation, but as a scaled operating system for higher throughput, simpler execution, personalization, and measurable unit economics: its Restaurant > NEXT pillar combines modernized restaurant design, standardized technology/data platforms, operational simplification, and systemwide deployment of GenAI-enabled ArchIQ across U.S. and international company-operated markets, with a target of roughly 250 basis points in gross restaurant-level efficiency—about $100,000 in annual cash-flow benefit for the average U.S. restaurant. While this announcement does not specifically call out kiosks, drive-thru AI, mobile order, digital menu boards, or automated pickup, it reinforces the strategic role those customer-facing and crew-facing self-service layers play: reducing friction, increasing capacity, connecting loyalty and personalized offers to the transaction, and making a 46,000-plus-unit global restaurant network easier to operate consistently. McDonald’s also plans roughly $8.5 billion in franchisee partnering support through 2036, including about $5 billion through 2030, to accelerate modernization, technology deployment, and operating improvements—an important signal that restaurant automation is being positioned as a franchisee ROI and productivity program, not merely a digital-experience upgrade.

Quick Looks

  • C-Stores emerging operational shift — The bitcoin kiosk retake is the section c-store operators should read first. Jackson, Michigan voted this week to ban them, and the ordinance puts the retailer hosting the machine on the hook alongside the operator, at $500 a day once the removal window closes. That changes who cares about getting the unit out. For a lot of c-stores the operator is bankrupt, consolidating, or three states away, and the machine is still bolted to the floor next to the register. Craig, are you seeing c-store chains start treating BTM removal as their own facilities problem rather than the operator’s? Thanks for the question Nicolas!  Are we seeing c-store chains start treating BTM removal as their own.._

McDonald’s Stuff

  • NEXT – An Investors Look — So why the stock drop? Where is $8.5B going? What are franchisees on the hook for? Doesn’t this remind us of Reclaim the Flame? Four year payback?  https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/mcdonalds-next-investor-look-craig-allen-keefner-cuaec/
  • McDonald’s is moving from stand-alone digital touchpoints to an integrated restaurant automation architecture, in which drive-thru voice AI, order validation, kitchen workflow, inventory, staffing, loyalty/personalization, and pickup infrastructure are increasingly managed as one system.
    • McDonald’s NEXT announcement contains more than broad AI talk, but it is not a new kiosk rollout. The clearest self-service development is ArchIQ, a GenAI-enabled restaurant operating system that includes “Archy,” a bilingual drive-thru voice-ordering tool currently being tested in five locations, alongside automation for inventory, scheduling and order-accuracy checks. McDonald’s says the platform could free roughly 50 labor hours per restaurant each week and is part of a wider Restaurant > NEXT modernization program targeting 250 basis points of restaurant-level efficiency and about $100,000 in annual cash-flow benefit at a typical U.S. restaurant. The significance is that McDonald’s is treating voice ordering, pickup, kitchen execution and crew tools as an integrated automation stack—not simply adding another self-order channel.

Trade Show Intelligence

What are people and companies interested in when it comes to self-service technology?

Consulting, Custom Reports and Consulting

  • We offer custom report for seqments, as deep as you want to go. Generally $299
  • Consulting – we have a stable of consultants if that is what you are looking for:
    • Self-service technology
    • Vendors, Suppliers and Competitors
    • Vending and Retail Automation
    • Top tier retail (including branding)
    • Conversational AI for service terminals (employees and guests)
    • Wayfinding and digital directories
    • Speakers for conferences.
    • Rates – depends on number of hours – between $100/hour to $400/hour

News

  • “We quickly realized if we force [AI to be] the only way that you can order or interact with our brand, it doesn’t go well,” Chakri Somisetti, Burger King’s vice president of brand technologies, said during a panel at the FSTEC conference Wednesday. “We’ve seen that in our pilot restaurants, there are drive offs because guests don’t want to talk to a bot.”  The chain is still testing voice AI in about 1,500 locations and is learning from those tests, Somisetti said. But it is developing a way for customers to have more of a say in how they place their order, Somisetti said.  Editor Note: While he didn’t say the exact words “some customers,” his phrasing (“if we force it… there are drive offs”) carries the exact same meaning: it’s a specific portion of their customer base pushing back, rather than every single person

 

 

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