We need a standardized grocery store organization system. Like dewey decimal.
I second this notion
I motion to pass
Aye.
Two Ayes here
“GO AROUND”
Hank Green gave a half joking presentation on this topic
This was my favorite Smartypants segment.
What makes you think stores would want that. The reason they reorganize stores to increase profits. They identified certain areas of the store that sell better and move product that they want to increase sales there.
Yeah, but fuck them. That’s why we have laws.
I’m curious. Are there countries with laws preventing that? If so, I’m curious which ones and what the law says? I can’t think of a good law that would prevent stores from doing that.
Well, the original post was proposing that we make that happen somehow. I propose that we use laws. There are lots of laws regulating the interior of a supermarket already, this is one more, although a potentially complex one.
As someone who spent years working retail, it works and is necessary. Gotta sell stuff to stay in business. It’s not always a scam to force you to buy things you wouldn’t.
Doesn’t even need to be moved to a high traffic area. Sometimes just moving it a few feet makes a difference. People get ‘product blind’ when it just sits in the same place forever.
How does this work? Do people not already know what they’re going to buy before going into the store? Does nobody make a list?!?!
I made a list. It’s at home. I should have made a list of things to take to the store so I could put the list on the list.
You never had situation when you saw something new and thought to try it?
If you never do that, then you are in very small minority. I do use shopping list, but still might occasionally get something more than what was on the list.
This is how stores could influence that through strategic product placement.
Generally the only time I do that is if the thing I like is out of stock so I have to look for a replacement. Most of what I eat is cooked at home though, so I’m just buying ingredients.
i don’t get angry because they rearranged the store, i get angry because they ONLY rearranged the store so some worthless, nepo-baby dipshit can justify their existence at the company because they came to the conclusion–after 25 focus groups-- that it’d increase shareholder value by $0.0003 to move the pasta to aisle 3
I figured they just do it regularly so customers have to look at more extra shit they might impulse buy, rather than based on some study of product location adjacency.
Having worked stock in a grocery store, this is part of it. After asking alot of different people at different levels, the consensus is that shelf space is also paid for by many brands, and what space goes to who is decided way above the store level. So once in a while the stockers get paperwork that moves a ton of stuff around, and no one who works in that location has the authority to say no. Sure, sometimes a manager will do that anyway, but they always have a reason, and it’s usually something about the reality of the store configuration, like not putting too many cold items near warm areas, to keep humidity down and reduce spoil.
I think you vastly overestimate the size of grocery store’s budgets
typical shareholder meeting in america:
ceo: i’ve come to a stunning conclusion, and i don’t want to ruffle too many feathers or cause a heart attack–we know what happened to MCfunky last week.
uneasy laughter
ceo: but i have a crazy idea that i’m sure is going to shock everyone in the room, and i’m hesitant to even say this out loud, but, how about we cut one employee per store and raise the prices on ALL items by a nickel!
the room of shareholders went completely silent, until the oldest of the bunch cut a huge fart. what happened next was a raucous laughter that wasn’t heard since the first test screening of ‘a princess bride’ and a round of applause that was usually reserved for a barack obama speech @ $200k a seat (champagne optional).
the forbes editor who was deployed to the meeting immediately came in his pants and a rothschild graciously committed to buying him a new pair, despite the known frugality of the ultra-wealthy (they wouldn’t be rich if they didn’t know how to work a penny). she told him, ‘meet me on rodeo drive next week and i got you covered’ but he missed the appointment because he was supposed to cover alysa liu’s birthday extravaganza.
she was fat anyway, at least that what he told himself. she was kinda fat by european or asian standards but we were in america and the rules of the wild west still apply. who cares how much money she has. alysa dyed her hair green this week. that’s all that really matters,.
You summed up one of the biggest problems in America pretty succinctly.
The soft drinks and sports drinks used to be right next to each other, now they’re 3 aisles apart. What were they thinking?!
sports drinks are a ‘health food’ now their sales are going up
soft drinks are a ‘bad food’ and their sales are going down
so they must be separated
so they must be separated
Marketing
I just don’t understand why the international foods are a separate aisle. Can those sauces not sit next to the other sauces? Can all types of noodles not co-exist in the same aisle? Why can’t masa flour live next to wheat flour?
The more I think about this, the more it annoys me.
There’s a lot of time and money spent analyzing where to put things to maximize customer spending. It’s why milk and eggs are usually at the back of the store, so that you have to walk through the entire store to get them, and you may find something else to buy on the way there. It’s also why “low-interest” items like international foods get put together in their own low-traffic aisle.
International foods might be “low interest” for many consumers, but for me it’s the most interesting aisle in the supermarket.
Nothing I like more than finding some unusual (to me!) stuff, so I’m happy they put it all in the same place.
As far as price goes, it’s all over. You might find a bottle of Japanese Kewpie mayo for way more than speciality Asian supermarkets ask for, but on the other hand find a huge bag of pistachio nuts for way less money (by volume) than they’re charging for nuts in the ‘regular’ nuts section.
It’s genuinely as if supermarkets know they need to sell this stuff, but haven’t quite worked out what to do with it yet.
That’s also why they rearrange things - not to optimise the layout, but because they hope people will impulse-buy things while looking for the things which have moved
Yes it does. It wastes more time and is deliberately designed to make you stay in the store longer and hopefully spend more money.
It’s because they keep doing it wrong!
Nah, but known layout is better than unknown.
This is why I can’t fuck with Trader Joe’s.
I swear Trader Joes does this specifically to make you walk the whole store. It’s small enough that you’re probably walking the whole thing anyway, but I can never just run in and grab what I might need.
100%. I don’t know how people shop there. It’s like a place to wander around and find random stuff.
I kinda miss grocery stores. Where I stay now there isn’t a single store like that, just many small shops. You get used to things maybe being there, maybe not.
You know the worst part of it? The reason why is to encourage the “hunter, gatherer” mode in your lizard brain. It’s basically a trick to get you to do impulse purchases.
Am I the only one feeling super unconfortable seeing these types of memes when the next article in my feed is about how 25% of people worldwide don’t have access to clean water?
No, you are not. The vast majority of people here and anywhere else on the Internet live in a luxury bubble compared to most of the world and a disturbing amount of them will never realise that.
The most accurate description of my pain. Thanks, family-grocery store that I loved.
That was actually me job for a year. I was that asshole at Walmart that moved everything. Better than stocking shelves since it was full time M-F. I still hate it 10 years after i left since i can’t locate shit at my Walmart. They moved the pharmacy section all the way across the store.
Some nights my job was to really deep clean the shelves and move maybe a few items to make room for a new product.
The problems came when our sheets tell us how much goes on a shelf and it’seven on the la els but then they just move the tags because they don’t want the cereal to look empty at that section. They also doesn’t like me in the back room because i would bring back loads of overstock because you let an employee stock an 12 boxes of cherios family size on the shelf and I’m following corporate guidelines that say that size should have 2 facings, not 4.
I will say cap 3, mod team, or whatever they call it was still the best job i had at walmart.
They moved my princess auto to a new location… it’s only like 5 min up the road, but all the layouts are different. Fucking shit fuck shit on you for this. I couldn’t have been more angry about something. Can’t find shit. The selection of hydraulics I need is significantly reduced. Everything that is related is now in complete other sections of the damn store.
The tools are usually in the center still, so that’s all I care about. But the outside aisles change depending on store size. I wish they would get rid of the cheap crap nobody buys at the back of the store and expand the important aisles with stuff we do buy.
Man in the old store they, had npt,jic,metric,orfs,orb,code 62 and adapters in between most of them or a way to get from one to another. Now it’s just jic and npt and only up to 1". They sell a damn 1.5" tank truck hose, but only 1.25’barbs and hose clamps.
Yeah alot of the stuff in the surplus is just shelf filler. Feels like they are just praying on hoarders and guys that are like “I’ll use that one day”
[
]
The older you get, the less excited and more annoyed at New for New’s Sake; the yoots either find it normal (everything is new when you’re brand new) or thrilling and exclusive (“Look, something changed! Wow! I bet fewer (older) people understand this!”)
When I go to the grocery store I’m not looking for an adventure, I just want to buy the things and leave. But that’s not as profitable.
