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Why do they block wifi in big supermarkets? Hateful places I know but, fancy making that recipe you saw last week, no signal, trying to log into the club card that logs you out every week, no signal??
What's the benefit?
My only thinking is that if you ever separate from a loved one while in there you may need to go to the cafe and spend between search missions?
I think it’s just that they’re large metal framed buildings with lots of electrical equipment inside ready to affect signals
It costs them money that they don't need to spend.
Do you mean block mobile signal? It won't be intentional, it'll be due to the building construction. All the ones I use have free wifi
Sainsbury's have free WiFi in their stores - was pointed out to me as I tried to pull up the email for an Argos collection the other day.
Free WiFi in Tesco, Aldi used to, not noticed recently if it's still there
Maybe it’s yer tin foil hat interfering with the signal? ?
Makes you think.
Lidl also have free WiFi, so you then don't have an excuse not to download the Lidl app to save a tenner of something.
They did also give me a free bag though.
Ok, it's a big metal box! I always thought they did it on purpose, they're not fat cats for nothing!
Now that's answered I'll move onto the big three, moonlandings, JFK and what happened in that Parisian tunnel..
Not sure how true this actually is but apparently, they block mobile signal inside the stores to get people logged into their free WiFi. Once logged on, they can track people's habits and see how they move around the store. They use this to help with product placements like where to stick promotional stuff.
Anonymously like, it's not tracking you as an individual. Although I'm sore the ability to do that exists with facial recognition and recognising you based on the card you use to pay.
I must be their worst nightmare because I zigzag and backtrack all over the place. Not intentionally, I'm just disorganised.
trying to log into the club card that logs you out every week
I use an app called Stocard. No logins required.
I don't seem to have any issues with mobile data in my local teso or sainsbury's.. Must be building construction /location dependent.
That said I put shopping list on Google keep notes which works offline so I don't really use internet in the supermarket so to speak.
You're 'one of them' aren't you... Supermarkets are for shopping, not clogging the place up while you browse Delia smiths latest blog...
I use an app called Stocard. No logins required.
Or add the card to your apple wallet, android equivalent.
Once logged on, they can track people’s habits and see how they move around the store. They use this to help with product placements like where to stick promotional stuff.
They’ve invented things called cameras that do that.
... and in fact, if a store did want to track you, they'd have more luck by getting mobile carriers on board rather than blocking them. The cell towers can triangulate your position, Wi-Fi has no clue beyond which AP you're connected to. Whether it's be with sufficient accuracy to know that you're on Aisle 7 or not I don't know, but it'd be plausible to use it for targeted advertising in a shopping mall.
Of course, this is all largely moot because Google (and I assume Apple?) carries your GPS data which can be used for highly localised advertising. Burger King pulled this stunt a little while ago, it sent burger offers and map directions to people who were outside McDonalds.
I’m 100% sure how true it actually is and the answer is “not at all.” Mobile signal jamming is illegal in the UK.
Jamming and blocking are different things though.
Jamming is illegal. Constructing a building purposefully in a way that means that signal doesn't get in.....not illegal..... Hell I work In one such building (not a supermarket)
I know it can work in shopping malls, for example if you leave your wi-fi on to find potential new hotspots.
It won't work on a company by company basis I guess, unless they pay 'someone' for the data... but you can track a mobile, and therefore many many mobiles and decipher that they spent ten mins in sports direct, and 3 hours in Anne Summers or whatever.
And build up a heatmap of traffic that way, even if it is pretty anonymous.
They’ve invented things called cameras that do that.
Arf. (-:
The other thing here is, supermarket shopper psychology is a mature science. They've been refining customer manipulation long before everyone had a smart communication device in their hand. There is a reason that the first thing you hit in any supermarket is fresh goods, ie the bakery or fruit & veg; there is a reason that beer is at the arse end of the store; there is a reason that you can never find where they keep the sodding batteries. "Come for a pint of milk, leave with an impulse-bought large TV" is a black art, none of this is random placement.
The local Food Warehouse (ie, Iceland) are bastards for this, You have to do the Ikea Shuffle snaking through half the store to reach the open-world areas which contain stuff you might actually have come in to buy, and no bloody thing is ever in the same place twice. I'm here for a bag of chips and a Slimming World ready meal, this should be a hit-and-fade operation but clearly they're named Iceland because I need a bloody Sherpa to navigate the place.
Constructing a building purposefully in a way that means that signal doesn’t get in
Well, yes, but "purposefully" seems something of a leap here to me. That's a very specific design requirement for what is, really, very little gain and possibly to their detriment ("I'm not going to Tesco, there's never any mobile signal"). It's also a bloody risky gambit if word got out that you were intentionally building stores which were Faraday cages in order to force customers onto your Wi-Fi because Reasons. How do you come back from that, tear down and rebuild all your shops?
Occam's Razor, I fear. We had the answer in the first reply, it's an electrically noisy environment built mostly out of metal. See also: hospitals, I can't get a signal as soon as I cross the threshold but I doubt it's a conspiracy by Big Hospital to see how much time I'm spending browsing Ward C27 at Royal Blackburn.
what happened in that Parisian tunnel
I crashed in the same tunnel. On a skateboard.
Got the death wobbles going down into the tunnel from loose trucks and skinned my knees. I felt Lady Di watching over me tutting at my lack of style as Parisians looking like extras from a John Paul Gaultier advert whizzed on by with their inline skates*
*I worked in the outskirts of Paris and the inner ring road was closed every Sunday?/once a month? (Can't remember) for locals to cycle/inline and I used to 'board around Paris on my weekends off.
The other thing here is, supermarket shopper psychology is a mature science. They’ve been refining customer manipulation long before everyone had a smart communication device in their hand.
And yet there is a good reason why mac randomisation was introduced on phones.
For annoyingly designed buildings lee valley white water centre is a fine example of accidental faraday cage. Phone reception vanishes and yet they have both centre website and a parking permit which you need to use your phone for. To make things more fun they then have QR codes for both of them. So lots of people standing around trying to get signal/logging onto the wifi/begging for the tablet they keep in reserve.
Meraki (and doubtless many others) WiFi has heat map and various analytics capabilities including tracking movement around the store, and repeat visits etc. You don’t even have to be logged in for a lot of it…
Constructing a building purposefully in a way that means that signal doesn’t get in…..not illegal….. Hell I work In one such building (not a supermarket)
It's more down to the fact that the cheapest, quickest way to put a retail space together under a single (large) roof is essentially to build a large metal box. Which in broad terms is a massive faraday cage.
The biggest challenge for most of these places is to ensure you *can* get a mobile signal in them.
Unless you have a lot of access points deployed I can't see how it would be that accurate. I suspect most mapping of how people flow through their stores is via cameras + software which has been around for many years.
Yeh it's annoying and also annoyingly variable between stores. Always assumed it was just the construction.
I mainly shop at our nearest asda and stop as soon as I go in to log in to their free WiFi, problem solved for the loyalty app, phone payment, and checking with the wife which exact yoghurt is acceptable this week.
Not sure how true this actually is but apparently, they block mobile signal inside the stores to get people logged into their free WiFi.
Amazing how folk post up total bollox stating it's FACT.
Did you also vote for Brexit?
West Quay in Southampton has signs on every entrance (high up so they are difficult to see) stating that you'll be tracked throughout the centre using your phone. Don't remember if it specifies WiFi or cellular however I'd imagine passive cellular would create more data.
Worst one ever is Bristol Airport. ****ing hateful place to get delayed. No mobile signal and dial-up WiFi. Brilliant.
Don’t remember if it specifies WiFi or cellular however I’d imagine passive cellular would create more data.
its probably bluetooth, as the range is lower\more accurate than anything else and your device is likely to have bluetooth on. Wifi isn't very useful as the device will stop searching for new connections once it's locked onto one, and tend to hold onto old connections even when they're not the nearest access point.
I totally forgot about Bluetooth. BLE perhaps.
Yeah Bluetooth makes sense..
Although mine (on my phone) is generally toggled off, and I turn it on manually for the odd ocasion I'm wearing headphones.
My Wi-fi is generally left on though.
Amazing how folk post up total bollox stating it’s FACT.
Strange that you used an example quote from a poster who did not do that.
Amazing how folk post up total bollox stating it’s FACT.
Did you also vote for Brexit?
Which part of the post you quoted was stated as FACT?
Did you vote for brexit? I only ask because you seem to have posted total bollox which apparently, are the same thing...
The cynic in me would assume they're blocking the mobile signals to:
1) to keep your attention on the products and shopping.
2) to stop you comparing prices
The conspiracy theorist reckons it's so they can properly calibrate the 5G nanites in their samosas to properly control your brain...
Tesco in Chippenham have moved out of the big store in a 60’s/70’s shopping mall and taken over part of the former Wilco’s store on the high street. The building is originally a Co-Op, and very solidly built, but the self-service checkouts are right by the front windows and the first time I went to use them, as it only opened a week or two ago, I couldn’t get the Tesco app to open to use it, and I didn’t have the card with me. I’d already scanned my items, and the machine called a staff member, who arrived just as the app decided to open and show my Clubcard QR code.
Very frustrating, but certainly not Tesco’s fault, it’s just that O2 don’t have much of a signal in the town centre. Here’s the building back in May, while it was being remodelled, and it’s not a flimsy metal shed!
The other front unit is going to be a Starbucks, for the love of all that’s holy! They opened one back when Starbucks was a Cool Thing, and there only a couple of little cafes in town. They closed about two years later, after other competition opened and people discovered Starbucks coffee is like making love in a boat.
Now there’s even more places to sit and eat and grab a coffee, and they’ve decided that what Chippenham needs, more than anything else, is a bloody Starbucks!
for anyone struggling with clubcard/nectar, add it to your google wallet (I imagine you can do similar on the iphone) and it'll be stored on your phone, regardless of reception. Super fast to load it up too