The snapshot
Carrefour Belgium implemented & tested a virtual wine advice assistant ‘Sommelier Benoit’ for its stores together with partner Devoteam G Cloud
A first version of the Sommelier Benoit voice bot was developed on Google Cloud with Dialogflow & the Google Assistant in just 3 weeks
The Virtual Wine assistant received 600 interactions within the first 10 days, enhancing the in-store experience for Carrefour Belgium customers
The challenge
Benoit Couderé is a renowned sommelier that worked as head sommelier at a three stars Michelin restaurant for many years. He is now in charge of the wine selection for Carrefour Belgium. Every Christmas season, sommelier Benoit visits stores all over Belgium to help customers find the best wine to go with their delicious meals.
Given the fact that there are only a few sommeliers at Carrefour that can assist customers personally at the stores, it’s impossible to reach the 800+ stores Carrefour has.
Having a solution that was scalable, where the knowledge of sommelier Benoit Couderé could be shared more easily with customers across the stores of the group was the challenge.
The solution
In a three week period, Carrefour Belgium and partner Devoteam G Cloud launched an Alpha version of virtual assistant Sommelier Benoit in three Carrefour stores. With this Alpha version, customers were able to start a conversation with the Sommelier Benoit virtual assistant, made available on a Google Nest Hub device that they could find at the wine section of their Carrefour store.
In only 10 days, the virtual wine assistant Sommelier Benoit that was present in the three Carrefour stores received 600 interactions from customers. This was achieved even without additional marketing around the virtual wine bot. Virtual Sommelier Benoit managed to answer accurately and give the right wine advice in 90% of the interactions.
The better change
Using Google’s Voice Assistant to better connect with customers
With 600 interactions in 10 days
Providing expert knowledge to employees and customers
Without any promotion or marketing, the first interactions were clear: 600 talks within 10 days and 90% of the questions answered. Now, driven by the data, let’s improve virtual Sommelier Benoit and give everyone access to our three stars sommelier in all kitchens and smartphones.
