Convenience store survey released

WESTMINSTER, Colo.--Video surveillance manufacturer 3xLogic in January released findings of an internal survey of 125 convenience store owners throughout the country. Conducted by the marketing firm Sales Edge, in conjunction with an effort to recruit participants in a webinar, company officials say the results may not be scientific, but are interesting nonetheless.

“It was very informal,” said David Nieweg, 3xLogic director of business development, “but it reflects a lot of things we're seeing on the sales side of things: There may be a lot of talk about new technology in the market, but not many installations or end user knowledge.”

For example, he said, of the 125 respondents, 100 percent used video surveillance of some kind, but zero percent used any form of video analytics. “Further, “the part that surprised me,” said Nieweg, “is that when offered the opportunity to learn more about it, even after we mentioned some of the capabilities, still only nine percent were even interested in being told about it. Sometimes I think we buy into our own hype a little too much.”

Along the same lines, only eight percent were using IP cameras, even though 75 percent had their systems connected to a network.

The good news? More than 90 percent of respondents were interested in measuring and managing the customer experience utilizing the surveillance system, and 73 percent wanted to be able to manage and evaluate employees.

As a company that's already marketing directly to end users and providing leads to its dealers, Nieweg says this tells 3xLogic, “We need to take it down several notches and really get into the trenches with their daily business objectives ... Sometimes we over-provide solutions.”

3xLogic has point-of-sale integration with a number of popular retail systems, and its solutions are designed to work with megapixel cameras like those provided by Arecont Vision and IQinVision.