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Be prepared to rise to today’s challenges and provide the seamless self-service customers are demanding with Fujitsu retail software.
Every year, NACS Show brings together retailers, technology providers, and industry experts to explore what’s next for the convenience retail industry. In 2026, it’s clear the conversations will move beyond selling fuel and stocking shelves and shift to creating faster, smarter, and more secure shopping experiences that keep customers coming back.
Consumer expectations continue to evolve. Shoppers expect speed, convenience, and flexibility every time they walk into a convenience store. At the same time, retailers are balancing rising operating costs, labor shortages, and increasing concerns about shrink. It’s a challenging environment, but it’s also one filled with opportunity for businesses willing to embrace innovation.
That’s what makes Fujitsu Frontech North America excited to return for NACS Show 2026.
Visit us at Booth #C6011 in the Technology section to experience how our latest retail solutions are helping convenience retailers simplify operations, improve the customer experience, and build more intelligent stores. From AI-powered self-checkout and cash automation to enterprise software and store operations tools, attendees will have the opportunity to see firsthand how connected retail technology can solve real-world challenges.
Why NACS Show Matters More Than Ever
The convenience retail industry is changing faster than ever. Today’s convenience stores have evolved well beyond fuel and grab-and-go snacks. Many locations now offer made-to-order food, fresh beverages, loyalty programs, digital payments, and expanded merchandise selections. As stores continue to diversify their offerings, technology has become essential to delivering the fast, seamless experiences shoppers expect.
The numbers tell the story.
According to the National Association of Convenience Stores, the United States is home to more than 150,000 convenience stores, serving millions of customers every day. Convenience stores remain one of the most frequently visited retail formats in the country, generating hundreds of billions of dollars in annual sales.
At the same time, retailers face mounting operational pressures. Labor shortages continue to make hiring and retention difficult, while shrink remains a major concern across the industry. Consumers also expect shorter wait times, contactless payment options, and more personalized shopping experiences than ever before.
These challenges aren’t unique to convenience retail, but they have an even greater impact because speed is at the heart of the business. Every second spent waiting in line can impact customer loyalty and overall profitability.
Technology has moved from a competitive advantage to a necessity.
Self-Checkout Has Become Part of the Convenience Experience
Just a few years ago, self-checkout was considered primarily a grocery store technology. Today, it’s rapidly becoming a familiar sight inside convenience stores.
Modern self-checkout gives retailers more flexibility to deploy staff in places where they create the greatest value for the store (i.e. preparing fresh food, stocking shelves, assisting customers, or maintaining store operations) while allowing shoppers to complete transactions quickly and independently.
Research from the National Retail Federation shows that retailers continue investing heavily in technology that improves both operational efficiency and customer experience. Artificial intelligence, automation, computer vision, and data-driven decision making have become major priorities as retailers navigate labor challenges and rising operational costs.
For convenience retailers, the shift to technology creates the ability to:
However, successful self-checkout deployments require much more than installing new hardware.
Retailers need solutions that integrate with existing POS systems, support associates, adapt to changing store environments, and help reduce friction for shoppers while identifying suspicious behavior. That’s where Fujitsu’s approach stands apart.
How to Experience Self-Service Simplified at NACS Show 2026
Instead of showcasing isolated products, Fujitsu Frontech North America’s booth will demonstrate how modern retail technologies work together to improve everyday operations. Visitors can explore solutions that address checkout efficiency, enterprise management, store operations, and AI-driven decision-making, all within a connected retail ecosystem.
S3: Self-Service Simplified
Our Self-Service Simplified (S3) philosophy focuses on making self-service intuitive, scalable, and easier to manage across every store. Rather than adding unnecessary complexity, Fujitsu’s solutions are designed to work with existing operations and workflows so that convenience retailers can deliver a consistent, reliable experience across all touchpoints.
This approach recognizes an important reality: every retailer operates differently. Some stores prioritize speed during the morning rush. Others focus on fresh food service, high transaction volumes, or minimizing shrink.
Technology should support your unique business goals. With Self-Service Simplified, you can add only the technology you need to obtain those goals, and stack on additional hardware and software as your needs evolve.
Visitors to our booth will have the opportunity to see this philosophy in action through live demonstrations that showcase how our convenience store solutions create a more efficient retail environment.
Friction Positive
One of the biggest misconceptions about self-checkout is that every customer interaction should be completely frictionless.
In reality, not every transaction is the same.
Most shoppers simply want to pay for their items quickly and continue with their day.
But others may need assistance scanning produce, verifying age-restricted items, or completing more complex purchases. Occasionally, transactions may require additional verification to help reduce fraud or errors.
The challenge for retailers is determining when intervention adds value. Fujitsu’s Friction Positive™ approach changes this conversation.
Instead of applying the same level of friction to every transaction, Fujitsu leverages AI technology to introduce the right amount of friction at the right time to guide shoppers through transactions quickly while protecting convenience retailers from shrink.
The result is a shopping experience that feels personable and easy to use for the shopper, while serving as an added layer of loss prevention for the retailer.
Whether you’re responsible for store operations, IT, loss prevention, finance, or executive strategy, Fujitsu’s booth is designed to show how these technologies solve practical business challenges.
Cash remains an important payment method for convenience retailers. SmartCASH SE, Fujitsu's compact cash automation solution, is designed to simplify cash handling at the front-end.
By automating cash acceptance and dispensing, SmartCASH SE helps improve accuracy and reduce the amount of time spent collecting and counting cash. The solution creates greater accountability, makes transactions faster, and delivers more efficient cash reconciliation processes.
For retailers managing busy checkout lanes, reducing the time spent counting, balancing, and transporting cash frees up associates to focus on helping customers.
As retailers expand their operations, managing multiple stores becomes increasingly complex. Software updates, system health, device status, and operational consistency all become more difficult to maintain without centralized management.
That's where Fujitsu Enterprise comes in.
Enterprise provides centralized visibility into self-checkout devices and other connected retail technologies across multiple locations. Instead of managing each self-checkout unit independently, retailers can remotely monitor system status, deploy software updates, identify maintenance needs, and gain valuable operational insights from a single platform.
Being able to proactively manage your self-service ecosystem means less time dealing with service calls and headaches.
Convenience retailers need to make the most of every inch of store space while giving customers more ways to check out. U-SCAN Express+ provides a compact self-checkout option that can help convenience stores add self-service capacity without requiring a large footprint.
Designed for fast transactions, U-SCAN Express+ gives shoppers a familiar and convenient way to complete their purchases on their own. Its compact configuration can also help retailers fit more self-checkout units into available space, giving customers additional checkout options during busy periods.
For retailers looking to expand self-checkout while making efficient use of limited floor space, U-SCAN Express+ offers a practical way to increase checkout capacity and keep customers moving.
Retail technology works best when it supports associates. Our goal is to deliver solutions that simplify everyday processes for store staff.
Fujitsu’s Quick Service Solution helps retailers improve operational efficiency by enabling smoother self-service food ordering, empowering in-store staff to react quickly to customer needs.
With less time spent taking orders, store staff can focus on more important customer-facing tasks like fulfilling orders quickly and helping shoppers in the store.
Consumers increasingly expect shopping experiences that are flexible, convenient, and aligned with the way they live. That’s why it’s important to explore new self-service formats designed to give shoppers greater independence and more familiarity.
Fujitsu U-Shop expands self-service beyond the checkout station, allowing shoppers to scan items on a device they are already comfortable using: their own mobile device.
By using their own smartphones to scan items throughout the store, shoppers can complete purchases at self-checkout more quickly while retailers improve throughput and reduce congestion at both self-checkout and traditional checkout lanes.
Behind every successful store is a team managing daily operational tasks, responding to issues, and ensuring everything runs smoothly.
Fujitsu Taskforce is a real-time communication and task management solution that delivers notifications directly to associates' store devices, ensuring the right people are alerted when action is needed. Team members can quickly acknowledge and accept tasks, providing managers with confidence that requests are being addressed without delay.
By connecting store teams through a centralized platform, Taskforce helps retailers respond more quickly to customer needs, improve coordination among associates, and keep daily store activities running efficiently. The result is a more responsive workforce, faster issue resolution, and a better experience for employees and customers.
The Future of Convenience Stores Starts at NACS Show 2026
The future of convenience retail will be shaped by how your retail technology solutions work together to create faster, smarter, more efficient store operations.
At NACS Show 2026, Fujitsu Frontech North America will demonstrate how an integrated approach to retail technology can help convenience retailers address some of their biggest challenges. Whether it’s accelerating self-checkout with AI-powered loss prevention and item recognition or improving operational processes, our solutions are designed to help retailers operate more effectively while enhancing the customer experience.
Together, these technologies help reduce friction at every stage of the shopping journey. By connecting people, processes, and technology, retailers can create stores that are better equipped to meet today’s demands with scalability for the future.
Visit Us at NACS Show 2026
The future of convenience retail is happening at NACS Show 2026, and there’s no better place to experience it than Booth #C6011.
Whether you’re exploring your ability to deploy self-checkout or looking for new ways to reduce shrink and streamline operations, our team will be ready to answer your questions and show you solutions designed to meet your needs.
We look forward to seeing you at NACS Show 2026! Contact us today to set up an appointment to meet in our booth.
Unlock the Future of Retail with Fujitsu
Bob Brower
Bob Brower has developed a reputation of diversified technology sales leadership success in software, hardware and services.
