{"id":84183,"date":"2025-06-11T13:10:19","date_gmt":"2025-06-11T17:10:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/network.napco.com\/total-retail\/?post_type=article&p=84183"},"modified":"2025-06-11T13:10:19","modified_gmt":"2025-06-11T17:10:19","slug":"walmart-starbucks-roll-out-ai-assistants","status":"publish","type":"article","link":"https:\/\/www.mytotalretail.com\/article\/walmart-starbucks-roll-out-ai-assistants\/","title":{"rendered":"Walmart, Starbucks Roll Out AI Assistants"},"content":{"rendered":"

Walmart announced last week it has launched a new artificial intelligence assistant called “Sparky” that will summarize product reviews, offer recommendations and help shoppers plan purchases. Separately, the global coffee chain Starbucks unveiled a generative AI assistant for baristas that will allow employees to ask questions about menu items and troubleshoot equipment issues, according to multiple news outlets.<\/p>\n

Walmart’s AI assistant Sparky will appear as a smiling “Ask Sparky” button in the Walmart app. It will answer product questions, compare options, and soon be able to automatically reorder household essentials and book services.<\/p>\n

Sparky’s release comes weeks after Walmart rolled out a similar AI assistant for merchants called “Wally.”<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Starbucks revealed its new barista AI assistant at its company Leadership Experience in Las Vegas last week, according to CNBC<\/a>. The “Green Dot Assist” platform is expected to launch across the U.S. and Canada in the company’s fiscal 2026. In addition to helping baristas quickly find recipes or troubleshoot issues, Starbucks said future iterations of the AI tool could include automatically creating a ticket with IT for equipment issues or generating suggestions for a substitute when a barista calls out of work.<\/p>\n

Created with Microsoft<\/a>, <\/span>Azure’s OpenAI platform, the AI assistant is slated to roll out to 35 locations later this month, according to CNBC.<\/p>\n

Total Retail’s Take:\u00a0<\/strong>OpenAI launched ChatGPT in late 2022, prompting companies to try to implement their own versions internally and for customers. Technology solutions company Neontri said in a May report<\/a> that 87 percent of retailers have already deployed the technology in at least one area of their business. Sixty percent of retail companies are planning to boost their AI investments in the near future, and by 2025, 80 percent of retail executives expect their organizations to adopt AI automation.<\/p>\n

Walmart and Starbucks join industry giants Amazon.com, Best Buy, and Target, which have all embraced AI assistants. Consumers can expect retailers to roll out additional iterations of AI, especially as it becomes mainstream for consumers and completely transforms the industry.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Walmart announced last week it has launched a new artificial intelligence assistant called “Sparky” that will summarize product reviews, offer recommendations and help shoppers plan purchases. Separately, the global coffee chain Starbucks unveiled a generative AI assistant for baristas that will allow employees to ask questions about menu items and troubleshoot equipment issues, according to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12267,"featured_media":84191,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","coauthors":[130797],"class_list":["post-84183","article","type-article","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-apps","category-artificial-intelligence","category-chatbots","category-e-commerce","tag-ai","tag-ai-assistants","tag-artificial-intelligence","tag-generative-ai","tag-starbucks","tag-walmart","editorial_type-news","collection-today-on-total-retail","vertical-retail"],"yoast_head":"\nWalmart, Starbucks Roll Out AI Assistants<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Walmart and Starbucks announced last week they were rolling out new AI assistants for customer and baristas, respectively.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" 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