Amazon Dash Makes Shopping as Easy as Pushing a Button The tech giant rolled out its expansion of the Dash program, which includes brand-specific buttons that let you order supplies.
By Nina Zipkin
So dedicated to making shopping and shipping streamlined for customers, Amazon has rolled out its latest gadget to make picking up a few things literally as simple as pressing a button.
This time last year, the tech giant came out with Dash, a portable home barcode scanner that connects to Wi-Fi and links up with an AmazonFresh account (same-day grocery delivery), to let users scan items around the house and put them into their Amazon cart.
The new Dash Button is free and available to Amazon Prime members by invitation. Using the same principle as the Dash scanner, the button is connected to a Wi-Fi network via the Amazon app. Once the button is pushed, an alert is sent to the phone for the same two-day delivery as they would get by ordering via the Amazon site.
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The buttons are brand specific, to order refill products from companies like Clorox, Glad, Bounty, L'Oréal, Gerber, Kraft and Maxwell House. They also come with a hook and an adhesive back so they can be put in laundry rooms, kitchens and hall closets -- just about anywhere to help customers remember to re-up on paper towels, detergent or mac and cheese.
In addition to the buttons, Amazon unveiled its Dash Replenishment Service, which is integrating the technology the company developed into devices that can sense when you are running low on coffee or printer cartridges and automatically reorder them. The service is being beta tested and products from Brita, Brother, Quirky and Whirlpool will be on the market in the fall of 2015.
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