Apple Pay Holdout Kroger Launches New 'Kroger Pay' Service

Wednesday February 13, 2019 12:59 PM PST by Juli Clover
Popular grocery store chain Kroger has launched a new mobile payments service called Kroger Pay, which it will be using in lieu of Apple Pay.

According to a WCPO, a local Cincinnati news site, Kroger Pay launched in Columbus and Colorado today, but will be expanding to all Kroger stores by the end of the year.


Kroger Pay is QR-based, so to pay, users need to open up the app and generate a single-use QR code that's scanned at checkout when making a purchase.

Kroger customers can link any major debit or credit card to the Kroger Pay app, and it also includes a Kroger Rewards debit card for earning fuel points and other rewards with purchases.
"Kroger Pay is one of the few mobile wallets that pairs loyalty and payment," said Mary Ellen Adcock, group vice president of operations. "The application of this exciting technology is another step in our front-end experience transformation."
With Kroger embracing its own payment solution, it looks like the grocery store chain has no plans to introduce support for Apple Pay. Kroger did test support for Apple Pay in stores that support contactless payments, but reportedly discontinued the program "due to little interest by customers."

Kroger in 2018 told a Reddit user that it did not have plans to implement Apple Pay in any of its stores.

Kroger has been working on its payments service for more than two years, and has been accepting the Chase Pay digital wallet since 2017.

Related Roundup: Apple Pay
152 comments


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nibfiledotcom
10 weeks ago


Kroger in 2018 told a Reddit user ('https://www.reddit.com/r/ApplePay/comments/8cgu5t/kroger_and_apple_pay/') that it did not have plans to implement Apple Pay in any of its stores.


You don’t implement Apple Pay; Apple and the banks already implemented it. You simply allow Apple Pay to work, along with every other contactless payment method out there.

Starting in 2020, both Visa and MasterCard will require merchants accepting payments via their networks to support contactless payment at all Point-of-Sale terminals in almost every market in the United States. The fallout from that should be interesting, because there are still more than a few large-scale retailers like Kroger who insist on implementing their own payment schemes so they can continue to harvest your data.

For now, I’ll be shopping exclusively at Giant Eagle instead. This is exactly how Walgreens got my loyalty, too.
Rating: 36 Votes
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Mikep976
10 weeks ago
Going the wrong way there Kroger...

Also, if you saw “little interest from customers” with Apple Pay, why would you think they would want to pull out their phone, open the app, wait for it to load, click to open the QR Code, and then have it scan.... versus just tapping their iPhone or Watch? This just screams “we want your data how we want it, not the privacy focused Apple way.”
Rating: 35 Votes
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Packdude
10 weeks ago
LOL, there was so 'little interest by customers' that they decided to spend 2 years working on their own app. Nice try Kroger.
Rating: 34 Votes
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dannyyankou
10 weeks ago
"Kroger Pay is one of the few mobile wallets that pairs loyalty and payment,"

Um Apple Pay can do this too
Rating: 23 Votes
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Trippy Bear
10 weeks ago
Another DOA pay system lol
Rating: 15 Votes
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mattyj2001
10 weeks ago
I'll give them another two years before they support Apple Pay, if not sooner if any type of data breach occurs due to their archaic QR based system.

Someone at Kroger should talk to someone at Target to find out why they suddenly are abandoning Target Wallet and starting to support all the major contactless payment systems ...
Rating: 14 Votes
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nibfiledotcom
10 weeks ago

Someone at Kroger should talk to someone at Target to find out why they suddenly are abandoning Target Wallet and starting to support all the major contactless payment systems ...


Sure, or talk to MCX about the abject failure of CurrentC. The reason these offerings fail, and will always fail, is because they aren’t built to simplify the customer’s life, they exist to solve the retailers’ problems— including not being able to track you anymore.
Rating: 11 Votes
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whyamihere
10 weeks ago
Oh dear lord, why do these companies insist on learning the hard way.
Rating: 9 Votes
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MagMan1979
10 weeks ago
This is yet another company who's management and IT departments have their heads WAY up their asses!
Rating: 7 Votes
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mcalict
10 weeks ago

As a Kroger shopper in TN, I find this disappointing. I understand they don't want to share profits from merchant fees but as Target learned this is not what people want.
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I dunno, because we still have to enter our Kroger loyalty card on the transaction, So even if it’s a different credit card number every time they still know that it’s the same customer.


Ditto. I'm in TN and shop my local Krogers a couple times a week. Have been waiting since my iPhone 6 for Kroger to get on board. The test obviously wasn't here because I'd have given their system a workout. Lack of interest my foot! I used ApplePay more in 3 days during a trip into Canada than in 6-months here in the States. The retailers here just don't get it. I'll keep shopping there but like others, I predict they'll learn the hard way and cave within 2 years.
Rating: 6 Votes
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