It looks like Apple Pay is ushering in a new era for mobile payments, if reports from retailers are a sign of things to come. The New York Times is reporting today that many retailers have seen a substantial increase in mobile payment traffic in the three weeks since Apple's mobile payment platform launched.
As far as numbers are concerned, Whole Foods has reported that it has processed more than 150,000 Apple Pay transactions thus far. That's in addition to McDonald's claim that Apple Pay accounted for 50 percent of its mobile payment transactions. Similarly, Walgreens, a launch partner for Apple Pay, said that its mobile payment transactions have doubled since the service debuted.
Not only has Apple Pay surged in popularity since its launch, but it has served to drive increased adoption of other mobile wallet platforms as well. Softcard, a carrier-backed mobile payment platform, has reportedly seen increased use as well — most likely as a result of the high-profile attention that Apple has brought to the mobile payment landscape.
On the topic of Apple's brand-power, Denée Carrington, an analyst with Forrester Research, was quoted in the NYT as saying:
Quite frankly, a lot of it has to do with the strength of the Apple brand and how much merchants and customers love how easy the experience is. I'm not saying it's changing the landscape overnight. But this has never happened with other mobile wallets.
It will definitely be interesting to see where the mobile payments landscape goes in both the short and long-term as more retailers adopt the technology and consumers become more aware of its existence.
Source: The New York Times