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Walmart, Costco and other companies rethink self-checkout, some stores removing them (www.cnn.com)
submitted 2 years ago by to c/technology@lemmy.world
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[–] 75 points 2 years ago (6 children)

No they aren't they are gonna lean in even harder what a dumbass story. One time fixed cost will always win over paying people in perpetuity

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  • [–] 21 points 2 years ago

    Yeah I have trouble believing this. They just remodeled the Walmart near me and I bet there's 60 self checkout machines. There's like maybe 3-5 normal checkout lines in between the self checkout.

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  • [–] 20 points 2 years ago* (1 child)

    I saw a grocery store put in the best self checkout lanes I've seen, then take them out a couple years later because their customers didn't like them.

    Things be weird sometimes.

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  • [–] 22 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    My favorite is still having them closed when low staffed because they still need a person dedicated to helping them.

    Just amazing how much trouble management goes to to make experiences for customers worse

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  • [–] 4 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    Exit gates you need a receipt to go through. That shit isn't even legal, I've been waiting for someone pushing that to the SC so they'll have to dismantle them nationwide.

    Ppft, stores thinking they can hinder my free movement in society? I'll go violent over that, that's where I draw the final line, no more of this capitalist surveillance shit, you put barriers in my way I'll stomp them to pieces.

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  • [–] 12 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    Kroger here just added two more lanes of self-checkout. We won't use them. We're a family of 3. We buy a lot of groceries. Doing it by ourselves would take so much more time.

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  • [–] 6 points 2 years ago

    Our Kroger had two rows of mini self checkouts, 2x3, and adjacent it was a cashier checkout. They removed one of the rows of minis and replaced it and the subsequent with a conveyor self checkout instead, so 3 minis and 2 conveyors.

    Now there are fewer places to check out, and the belted checkout is annoying as all hell to use. If you have 3 items it's wasteful to use it because you have to walk 5 feet to fetch your bags, and if you have a large cart of groceries you wouldn't want to self checkout anyway because it's a hell of a lot easier to have help.

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  • [–] 6 points 2 years ago

    I keep seeing stories every so often on Facebook about this. I feel like these stories just pop up to bring up engagement on the site. most stores in my area (Florida) have increased self checkout

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  • [–] 5 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    Yeah I think they saw a couple of examples Of stores taking out the self checkout lanes and ran with them. Although you could say the theft that the self checkout lanes allow is a recurring expense, but that's probably not nearly as much as the saving that the machines give.

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  • [–] 14 points 2 years ago

    It isn't. Or at least it isn't as big of a problem as they are letting on. https://www.retaildive.com/news/retailers-crime-problem-numbers/699107/

    Shrink has hovered around 1.5% (that's 1.5% of total sales...) And the NRF has been coy about the fact that 1/3 of that shrink is "administrative" issues - lost product, mis allocated, warehouse issues, broken in transit, etc.

    Additionally, a little less than a third is from employee theft, and a the remaining 36% is external theft.

    But since they lump mistakes and general admin issues in with theft, they get to claim a higher number whenever they complain very loudly so that they can redirect the conversation away from the massive increase in profits they have had, along with the increase in wage theft cases they are losing, as well as trying to cover up the fact they are closing "under performing" stores in poorer neighborhoods (which not limits access to people in those locations, but the store doesn't care, they dont buy stuff anyway...).

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