A TikTok user has gone viral after she used an unlikely payment method at a Whole Foods Market.
Lauren Saponara, 23, posted a video under her TikTok handle @laurasaponara on May 11 that shows her purchasing a bag of Cherries at a Whole Foods Market store just by using her hand.
‘I’m trying to buy these cherries at Whole Foods, and I can pay with my palm,’ she stated.
Saponara and another customer were shocked after the payment method went through shortly before they started walking away from the self-checkout.
Since then, TikToker’s video has received over 1.5 million views, and nearly 700 users have left comments about the payment method.
Lauren Saponara, 23, posted a video under her TikTok handle @laurasaponara on May 11 that shows her purchasing a bag of Cherries at a Whole Foods Market store just by using her hand
Saponara and another customer were shocked to see that the payment did indeed go through and remained so while they walked away from self-checkout
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The 23-year-old TikTok user claimed in her profile description that she is an Aruban who currently resides in California.
Saponara did not clarify what Whole Foods Market location she went to, but there are currently seven locations in Los Angeles.
She appeared to be wearing a dark sweatshirt while she was at the store and she only purchased a bag of Primavera Select cherries.
The TikToker then opted to pay for the item using a palm print recognition method called Amazon One.
Its website describes the feature as ‘a free, contactless service that lets you use your palm to pay, enter, or identify yourself.’
The only way Saponara could’ve been able to use this payment method in her TikTok video was if she created a profile and linked it to her Amazon account.
The TikToker was able to pay for the store item with her palm and it only took her about five seconds to do so.
This palm print-paying technology first began being implemented in select Whole Foods Market stores after Amazon acquired the grocery store chain for $13.7 billion in 2017.
Saponara did not clarify what Whole Foods Market location she went to. There are currently seven Whole Food Markets locations in Los Angeles, which is where she lives
The TikToker managed to pay with her palm through an Amazon One account. This pay-by-palm technology is currently in every Whole Foods Market location in the US
Officials installed the pay-by-palm technology in Whole Foods Market stores near Amazon’s headquarters back in 2021.
It is now one of the available payment methods at all of the supermarket chain’s US locations and be featured in its upcoming small-format stores.
Several TikTokers who commented on Saponara’s video were not thrilled about the technology and one person wrote that the payment method made them ‘scared & confused.’
One user, who claimed to be a Whole Foods Market employee, wrote in their comment that a person has to ‘set it up fully for it to work.’
Saponara responded to the user’s comments that were made after another person questioned her response and explained what Amazon One was.
The only way Saponara could’ve used Amazon One is if she connected the feature to her Amazon account
Other TikTok users were surprised by the payment method. Saponara did not respond to many comments, but she wrote a few heated responses
‘As an ex Whole Foods worker, I was so scared when they brought those in. I didn’t use it either,’ a TikToker commented.
Other users have explained in their comments how Saponara was able to use Amazon One, but it’s continued to scare other Whole Foods Market shoppers.
‘Every time I see that at Whole Foods, I get freaked out, but I’ve never tried it,’ one person wrote.
A few users asked questions about the method, and one person wanted to know what would happen if some palms were similar to one another.
However, more than one TikToker also trashed technology as a whole rather than the pay-by-palm feature.
One person wrote: ‘I refuse to believe this is in my universe.’