AI Just Made Car Washes Creepily Personal
PLUS: Find the Hidden Friction in Your Onboarding (And the Secret Opportunities Too)
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📅 October 1, 2025 | ⏱️ 3-min read
🎯 The big picture
So here’s the thing—AI just stopped being that awkward tech thing you heard about and became your actual personal butler. I’m not kidding. This week I watched AI learn what you want before you even ask, talk like your best friend instead of a robot, and make boring stuff surprisingly fun. The future snuck up on us while we were all debating whether AI would steal our jobs. Plot twist: it just made everything way better.
📊 Today’s lineup
• Amazon’s new Alexa+ finally talks like a human (customers can’t get enough)
• Price.com’s AI knows about 1 billion products and saves your money on autopilot
• Your car wash now remembers exactly how you like things (yes, really)
• Brands figured out how to make AI chatbots that people actually trust
• AI shopping search is blowing up while “online only” shopping just crashed hard
1️⃣ Amazon’s new Alexa+ finally talks like a human (customers can’t get enough)
What’s happening:
• Amazon just dropped Alexa+ and it’s like they finally taught their robot to have an actual conversation instead of just following commands.
• You can literally talk to this thing like you would a friend—no more robotic “Alexa, set timer for five minutes” nonsense.
• People who got their hands on it early? They’re using it twice as much as the old Alexa. Yeah, twice.
What’s so great about this: Remember how frustrating it was to talk to Alexa like you’re programming a computer? Those days are over. Now you just say “I want the lights on when I get home from work” and it figures everything else out. No more memorizing specific phrases or getting that annoying “Sorry, I don’t understand” when you talk like a normal human.
What’s next: Here’s what’s crazy—once you experience an AI that actually gets what you’re saying, every other voice assistant feels broken. Your customers are about to expect every voice interaction to feel this natural. The brands still making people learn robot-speak? They’re going to feel ancient.
Go deeper: ZDNet
2️⃣ Price.com’s AI knows about 1 billion products and saves your money on autopilot
What’s happening:
• Price.com just launched something pretty wild—an AI that knows about literally 1 billion products and hunts down deals for you automatically.
• Instead of you doing the endless scrolling and comparing, you just tell it what you need and it does the detective work.
• They raised $12M right before holiday season because apparently everyone wants an AI shopping buddy.
What’s so interesting: You know that feeling when you spend hours researching the best deal only to find out later you missed something better? This AI actually prevents that. It’s like having a friend who’s obsessed with finding deals do all the legwork while you just describe what you want. The AI doesn’t just find stuff—it actively saves you money and discovers things you’d never think to look for.
What’s next: Traditional online shopping is about to feel like using a flip phone. When AI can have real conversations about what you need and negotiate better deals than you could find yourself, why would anyone go back to typing keywords into search boxes? Retailers who can’t keep up with this level of smart assistance are going to watch customers walk away to platforms that actually understand them.
Go deeper: Globe Newswire
3️⃣ Your car wash now remembers exactly how you like things (yes, really)
What’s happening:
• AMP just turned car washes into something that actually knows you—like, remembers your preferences and everything.
• The AI learns that you always want extra wax, hate the pine air freshener, and prefer to pay without talking to anyone.
• What used to be “Would you like the premium wash?” every single time becomes “Your usual?” when you pull up.
What’s so great about this: This is where AI gets really cool—it takes something totally mundane and makes it feel personal. Think about it: you’ve probably been to the same car wash dozens of times and they still treat you like a stranger. Now the AI remembers you like a good bartender remembers your drink order. It’s the difference between feeling like a transaction and feeling like a regular.
What’s next: Once you experience a service that actually remembers you, everything else feels weirdly impersonal. Your customers are going to start expecting every business to know their preferences. The companies still treating every customer like it’s their first visit? They’re going to feel cold and outdated real quick.
Go deeper: Kiosk Marketplace
4️⃣ Brands figured out how to make AI chatbots that people actually trust
What’s happening:
• Companies are finally cracking the code on AI that doesn’t make you want to scream “REPRESENTATIVE!” into your phone.
• ICICI Bank’s AI explains complex financial stuff in normal human language instead of making you decode banking jargon.
• Plot twist: customers are actually starting to prefer these AI assistants because they’re more helpful than the human agents who just read scripts.
What’s so interesting: Remember when chatbots were universally terrible? Turns out the problem wasn’t that they were robots—it was that they acted like bad robots. These new AI assistants actually explain things clearly instead of confusing you more. When an AI can break down a mortgage application in plain English instead of financial gibberish, people feel smarter and more confident about their decisions.
What’s next: Industries that still speak in jargon are about to have a problem. When AI can make complex services feel simple and accessible, customers aren’t going to tolerate being confused anymore. The companies still hiding behind technical language will lose out to brands that actually communicate like humans.
Go deeper: MediaNews4U
5️⃣ AI shopping search is exploding while “online only” shopping just crashed hard
What’s happening:
• Bazaarvoice just dropped some wild data—”online only” shopping crashed from 29% to just 7% this year while in-store shopping jumped to 29%.
• But here’s the kicker: AI search is getting more popular, not less. People aren’t abandoning digital tools—they’re using them smarter.
• Turns out customers want AI to do the research so they can make better decisions when they actually touch and feel products in stores.
What’s so great about this: This completely flips the “digital vs. physical” debate on its head. People aren’t choosing between online and offline—they’re using AI to be smarter shoppers everywhere. They research with AI, compare options with AI, then go to stores to experience products before buying. It’s like having a super-smart shopping advisor in your pocket who helps you make better decisions no matter where you are.
What’s next: The whole “omnichannel” buzzword just became real in the most unexpected way. Customers want AI-powered intelligence combined with human experiences. Retailers who can’t connect digital smarts with physical service are going to watch customers flock to brands that use AI to enhance everything, not replace everything.
Go deeper: KTLA
⚡ Quick hits
• E-commerce platforms using AI to predict what you’ll want before you know you want it → better inventory and happier customers when stuff’s actually in stock
• Big brands letting AI create their ads and marketing content behind the scenes → turns out robots are pretty good at making content that doesn’t suck
• Food delivery apps making human customer service a paid premium → most of us are now talking to chatbots when our order gets messed up
💡 CX Prompt Tip of the Day
Find the Hidden Friction in Your Onboarding (And the Secret Opportunities Too)
I want to discover exactly where new customers get stuck in our onboarding and spot the biggest opportunities to wow them instead of just getting them through.
Context: Our onboarding involves [describe your key steps] and we notice people dropping off at [mention where you lose people]. When onboarding works perfectly, customers should [describe the ideal outcome].
Your task:
1. Map every single moment from “hello” to “successfully using our product” - include the tiny moments we usually ignore
2. Find the top 3 places where customers hesitate, get confused, or just give up
3. For each problem spot, figure out what’s really causing it and design a fix that eliminates the friction completely
4. Identify 2-3 places where we could actually delight customers instead of just checking boxes
5. Create a simple 30-day test to validate which improvements actually move the needle on completion rates
Format: Onboarding Stage → Where People Get Stuck → Why They’re Stuck → How to Fix It → How to Delight Them → How We’ll Measure Success
Focus on quick wins you can ship next week while identifying the bigger improvements that’ll take dev time.
Quick win: Go through your own onboarding this week like you’re a brand new customer. Record yourself doing it. You’ll spot friction points in the first 5 minutes that your team has been blind to for months.
🤔 CX reflection
Question of the day: If AI can make car washes remember your preferences and voice assistants actually understand what you mean, what’s the most boring touchpoint in your customer experience that could become surprisingly awesome with the right AI magic?
Talk tomorrow!
Mark