Frequently Asked Questions

Getting your own robot is easy.
Getting your team to use it… even easier.

Is Tally right for your store?
How big does the store need to be for Tally to make sense?

Your store should be bigger than a neighborhood convenience store, ie >1,000 sq ft, but most of the stores we’re in are >5,000 sq ft. The more products you have, the faster the payback period. Is there a max size? Not really.

Does it matter what kind of category my store is in?

Grocery, Drug, and Value Store
Tally is great for things in grocery stores packaged in bottles or boxes. It can’t count apples and radishes. Yet.

Superstore
Tally is great with SKUs it can see. But it can also use RFID to find and count things that are hidden, like a t-shirt in a stack of t-shirts.

Consumer Electronics
Both Tally’s computer vision and RFID will do a great job here.

Apparel
Yes. Tally will find those jeans in that special size, even if someone put it in the khakis rack. By mistake of course.

Can Tally scan everything?

In fast-moving-consumer-goods stores (mass market, grocery, drug, and value chains) Tally can capture any package goods in center store grocery and health care and beauty. Today, we exclude the bakery, deli, and produce.

Can Tally tell how many products are on the shelf?

For computer vision scans, Tally can tell which products are not on shelf and which are missing facings.

For RFID, Tally takes precise inventory counts assuming all products are tagged.

How many Tallys do I need per store?

Typically one Tally per store. Tally scans between 15-30K products per hour depending on product density, store size, and store traffic. One Tally unit is enough for stores up to 80,000 SKUs. An additional Tally unit can be deployed to speed up notification time if needed.

What is Tally’s impact on my business?
What should I expect to gain from having Simbe in my stores?

Contact our team to get an estimate based on the type and size of your store .

How much does Tally cost?

You don't have to buy Tally. In fact, there are zero upfront costs. Tally is a Robot-as-a-Service. You pay a monthly fee, depending on the size of your store, the number of SKUs, and whether you use computer vision and/or RFID.

Is it hard to get Tally going?
What does Day 1 look like?

Easy. We'll drive Tally around to create a store map, tell it where the charging dock is, and when to go on strolls. Done.

How do you operate Tally?

Well, you don't. Tally is a zero-maintenance robot. If something does go wrong, our team is alerted and we can make fixes remotely. If something physical requires fixing, a Simbe support engineer will visit the store.

Do I need to train my IT team on this?

No. You don’t even need a dedicated “handler” in each of your stores. Tally is self-sufficient. If there’s an issue you can call us, but chances are that we already know about it and are on it.

How long will it take for us to produce reliable information?

Months? Quarters? Neither. For new customers it takes about 7 days to achieve the accuracy we want. For existing customers new-store data confidence is much higher and can usually post the first day Tally is running. Real-time images are available right away on Day 1, even if it’s the first day with a new customer.

How do I get the data integrated into our systems?

Surely that’s a lot of work. Right?
Actually, it’s not that hard. And it’s something we will help you with.  We'll provide you our standard API documentation which will allow us to start feeding you the data.

Do I have to do anything for Tally to recognize on-shelf items?

Once we know which products are in-store through shelf tags, your authorized products list, or planogram, we pull high quality image data for each product from 3rd party sources. But we don't need to recognize the product to start adding value in the first few days: we provide price audits and OOS/missing facing analysis without knowing what any of the products look like.

For RFID SKUs we know everything – SKU name, size, color – from the scan.

How do store product data or planograms get loaded into Tally?

Tally is designed to work with as little data as possible. In fact, Tally can provide value without any authorized product/carried in-store files, planograms, or shelf tag specs. However, if any of this information can be provided it will speed up time-to-value.

What if I don’t have planograms?

See above. Most retailers don't have accurate planograms. That’s why we generate a realogram (up-to-date planogram based purely on what we see in-store).

What wireless networks does Tally need?

Wireless network, 802.11ac (5 GHz), WPA2 or stronger encryption.

What’s it like having Tally around?
How long does it take to scan a store?

Your average large supermarket takes 1.5-2 hours for a single scan and Tally typically scans up to 3x per day: one in the morning to validate last night's restock, once in the afternoon to fill any holes with backstock, and once in the evening to provide recommendations to the restocking team.

For stores that use RFID, typically one precise inventory audit per day is sufficient.

How reliable is Tally?

Tally is designed for long-term operation. We have units in our fleet that have already performed thousands of kilometers & hours of autonomous operation without intervention or field service. Because we offer Tally as a service, if something does go wrong it's our responsibility to fix it.

Where does Tally live in the store?

Tally typically charges itself at its charging dock, which is often located near a low traffic spot in store.

How does Tally get maintained or cleaned?

Simbe’s fleet operations team provides 24/7 robot support. Most issues can be addressed remotely. If the hardware needs to get fixed, a Simbe representative will come to your store. We can also drop ship a new unit.

Tally is designed to handle the normal wear and tear in the store. The rugged finish and sensor covers are designed to protect Tally.

Do you need to plug Tally in?

Nope. Tally self docks and will charge itself.

Still have questions?