By Aimee Chanthadavong
Earlier in the year, RetailBiz reported The Co-Op Bookshop was trialling a virtual window shop using QR codes at Macquarie University in an aim to reduce queues. Now the company has enlisted PayPal to help improve this service.
Greg Smith, chief customer officer of The Co-Op told RetailBiz unlike its piloted counterpart that took customers to a purchasing website that was not mobile-friendly when a QR code was scanned, the custom-built mobile site by PayPal been developed to make transactions faster and easier.
The solution now enables customers to use their smartphones, take a photo and press two buttons to complete the transaction securely using PayPal. The specially created mobile website provides access to over 160 textbooks. It also gives customers the option to choose whether they’d like to have to it delivered for free at home or pick the book up in store.
Also, to encourage students to “beat the queues”, students are offered $10 cashbacks for using the service.
The display is now set up at 10 university locations across Australia, including The University of Sydney, The University of Melbourne, and the University of Queensland.
“The Co-op Bookshop came to us needing a solution that would help reduce the large queues deterring students from purchasing textbooks from their stores. We worked with them to develop a QR-code shopping experience and a fully transactional mobile site within a month,” Jeff Clementz, managing director for PayPal Australia, said.
Smith has also exclusively revealed to RetailBiz from this process The Co-Op Bookshop will be even more mobile.
Currently, the QR displays are only available on the store shopfront but the company will be working with universities to take these QR code-enabled walls to selected major lecture theatres using pull-up style banners.