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13 Also offering assurance as custom- ers enter a store, Banner Engineer- ing has introduced its Occupancy Monitoring System . Part of a full suite of Safe Work Solutions, Occupancy Monitoring was developed for retail businesses to operate seamlessly while adhering to safe social distanc- ing guidelines. The automated solution uses optical sensors to count patrons as they enter or exit a store, break- room or bathroom and tallies them against a programmed capacity thresh- old. Visual indicators signal capacity alerts in familiar green/yellow/red lights or via a networked device. Banner’s wireless monitoring devices install with minimal effort and do not require alterations to a building’s infra- structure, said the company. The platform also enables retailers to use monitoring data to track peak traffic trends for better scheduling and purchasing metrics. “Now more than ever, monitoring occupancy plays a pivotal role in retail survival,” said Todd Hanson, senior product line director at Banner Engi- neering. “Our solution allows locations to reach prescribed capacity safely and only pause entry when necessary.” Similar to social distancing, thermal management is a phrase and concept that has become commonplace in a post-COVID reality, and several ven- dors now offer non-invasive, no-stop methods for collecting and monitoring customers’ body temperatures. Certify , a healthcare technology provider since 2012, this summer add- ed SnapXT thermal management plat- form to its product line. SnapXT’s ther- mal scanner reads body temperatures within 6 feet in less than one second and customizes SMS alerts and a va- riety of reporting for high temperature notifications. The dual-facial recogni- tion cameras (IR and RGB) incorporate a state-of-the- art NIST-compliant facial recognition algorithm and NFC, RFID and QR code reading technology. Com- pletely customizable and configurable, the platform can be managed di- rectly from the wall-, tripod- or desktop-mount- ed device or via the cloud. SnapXT also integrates a touchless, customized COVID-19 questionnaire and compliance reporting tool that users can complete and later update. Prices for the system start at about $2,000. Going even a few steps further, Kog- niz has developed a Heath Response Platform that utilizes (the very buzzy) artificial intelligence (AI) to track and monitor several in-store mitigation efforts. The platform’s fever-screening method continuously tracks the body tempera- tures of groups of customers and workers from a distance, eliminating close contact or time spent waiting in lines. All the while, the AI capabilities factor in environmental dif- ferences to provide precision results. The Kogniz re- sponse platform also can be set up to send alerts when too many people are in one space, allow- ing shopkeepers to swiftly enforce social distance protocols, and can even identify when employees are wear- ing proper safety gear and send alerts when someone is not. The sys- tem’s AI capabilities also can identify areas in a building visited by people dis- playing symptoms, meaning sanitization efforts can be better targeted, saving shopkeepers both time and money. A Kogniz Health Cam is the only on-site hardware needed to power the Health Response Platform, which can run on a business’s existing local area network. Fully aware that many outdoor retail- ers are not fully operational until custom- ers are comfortable trying on clothes, Bold Metrics recently came to market with its Al-powered Contactless Fit . Contactless Fit helps shoppers find the right size without ever physically trying on clothes. Customers answer four to six questions either on a stand-alone tablet or directly on their phone, and Bold Metrics uses eight years of data and machine learning algorithms to pre- dict a customer’s best size – no measur- ing tapes or photos required. According to Morgan Linton, Bold Metrics co- founder and COO, the system usually is within 1 percent to 2 percent of what a body scanner would output, which is similar accuracy to a master tailor. Contactless Fit works with exist- ing in-store technology, from iPads to existing point-of-sale solutions, or Bold Metric can deploy a standalone point- of-sale option. Tech Savvy Inside Outdoor | SPRING 2020 Banner Occupancy Monitoring System is about the size of a soap dispenser The desktop-mounted SnapXT device Kogniz offers real-time, high-flow health monitoring