After a test run in Paris since March 2018 in some Franprix shops and in the prototype Casino store “Le 4”, the Casino group has just opened its first supermarket in Lyon which will remain open 24 hours a day, every day. The employees are replaced at night and on Sundays by technology and a handful of security guards.
According to the news program 20 Minutes, this Casino supermarket of the Cours Gambetta (or “Garibaldi”), which covers over 20,000 square feet in Lyon, adopted continuous opening hours on December 6th. Since April already, it stayed open until midnight (with alcohol sales ending at 9pm). It will now be open all night but without employees. Customers will do their shopping under the watchful eye of surveillance cameras and security guards, and in order to pay for their purchases, they will use an automatic checkout or the Casino Max application, which allows you to pay directly with your mobile. Only a call button can put you in contact with a “real” Casino employee if necessary.
According to the 20 Minutes news program, the supermarket has about 150 customers in the evening before midnight and another 50 later on, during the night.
The “24H service”, as the Casino group calls it internally, will be deployed in 2019 on a case-by-case basis in urban areas. Even in rural areas, some stores will benefit from this service by opening their doors on Sunday afternoons but not during the night.
