791–800 of 865 posts
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I work 40 hours a week. Sometimes I work 45, and I usually offset it by cutting it shorter the next week. I have no need (or desire) to "strike" just because some businesses/orgs/teams are garbage.
No competent programmer I know has to work 40 hours a week to have their needs met. The best ones charge rates would allow them to have their needs met working <10 hours a week.
Oof. I wonder what this means for Whole Foods culture and employees. If you don't know, John Mackey, the CEO / founder, is a major believer in conscious capitalism and of empowering his employees. Whole Food employees get paid pretty darn well with some crazy good benefits for their industry and line-of-work (UNION FREE most of the time too!). WF banks on them being true believers and motivators of the cause - includ…
It's nice to see non-union employees treated well and paid well, not because of any negative feelings toward unions or unionization, but because I think it shows that you can be a successful capitalist without trying to suck every ounce of productivity and profit out of your lowest-paid employees.
My hope is it doesn't turn into Safeway. I literally pick the line with the least angry Checker.
The CEO said he would bring down the price of the basics, and he delivered. The price of milk, eggs, sugar, most 360 products are cheaper than Safeway. They do have a lost liter of wine that's pretty good. It's usually hidden though. It's $2.40/bottle. Forget the name. Three something?
Plus--I think Bezo is predicting the future. There will be very rich people that will always be buying. I don't have a rosy view of our future. I don't want to live in a society that gets used to steping over the homeless in order to buy groceries, and sundry items. Oh yea, I will never understand that cosmetic/nutrition isle. $30 for shampoo?
On a selfish note, I wish I trusted my gut a year ago. I wanted to buy Whole Foods, and Amazon stock. Just figured I can't take a risk.
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In the 1880s Bismarck increased the modern welfare state (it was called State Socialism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_Socialism_(Germany) ). The idea was that, if the poor people can get some form of social welfare from the existing state, they're less likely to support a proper socialist/communist revolution. Sounds like that. People won't unionise when they don't think they need to.
This is a great discussion of company culture, treatment of employees, worker cooperatives, etc., but I hoped HN would go deeper into the business and technology implications. What is the strategic logic behind this move? NYT, WaPo, WSJ, Bloomberg all take the same line: this is about Amazon's expansion into brick-and-mortar retail. They need a physical footprint, knock out Instacart for delivery, accelerate Amazon G…
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I really don't undertand how companies like Blue Apron and Plated ever expected to be in business very long. Do they get many repeat customers? Theoretically a subscriber would actually learn to cook over time and then Blue Apron would lose that customer... I just don't understand the long term goal.
I know many people that know how to cook (well) that use Blue Apron. What they don't like to do is a) go to the store(s) all the time for fresh ingredients, and b) they like trying new things.
I was super skeptical about food delivery, but I've become a believer. We get more meals at home, with less stress and time wasted, for a small premium above shopping at the grocery store.
It's a very immature market today, in another 10 years I think it will be the typical approach for most home cooks that aren't on a tight budget.
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Don't count out Kroger, the largest supermarket chain in the US. According to Wikipedia in 2015 it trailed only Walmart and Costo in worldwide revenue, and had 20% more revenue than Amazon. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Retail#Global_top_ten_retailer...
The Kroger-based store where I live just botched a floor-plan change so badly I should hope that it was just a local screw-up. This particular grocery store went from okay to "penny-thriftstore" useless.
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no thanks. look at what collective/forced/politicized bickering over hours has done to the job market everywhere its been tried. look at the corruption. i enjoy my freedom to negotiate my terms as I, as an individual, and my employer see fit.
I lived and worked in Iceland for five years, and they have a virtually 100% unionization rate. It's handled at the industry level rather than individual companies, but when you start a job, you are pretty much automatically enrolled in the union relevant for your work. A little money comes out of your paycheck, and the union is there in case you have problems. The unions also provide other benefits. For example, mos…
We need new political platforms focused on consensus-based policies. Not distinguishing our groups from "the other"
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> Conglomerates have happened in the past. They become very big until they stop making a lot of money and people realise that they could be more efficient if you split them up. Yeah, who could forget when companies like Standard Oil or AT&T decided to split up, entirely through the power of market forces, with no government intervention at all.
Conglomerates are companies that hold unrelated businesses. Berkshire Hathaway is a conglomerate. Railroads and car insurance in the same company! Standard oil and AT&T were not broken up because they were conglomerates. They were broken up because they were monopolies in single (or closely related) markets.
Mr. Bezos: - Alexa, buy me something from Whole Foods Alexa: - Good. Buying Whole Foods.
Oof. I wonder what this means for Whole Foods culture and employees. If you don't know, John Mackey, the CEO / founder, is a major believer in conscious capitalism and of empowering his employees. Whole Food employees get paid pretty darn well with some crazy good benefits for their industry and line-of-work (UNION FREE most of the time too!). WF banks on them being true believers and motivators of the cause - includ…
You know, if they had unions than an acquisition wouldn't really have a negative effect on their benefits
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Challenge often becomes an opportunity. Instacart recently landed Publix who has MUCH higher market share in the markets they serve. Disclaimer: I'm an Instacart investor.
Challenge will be that folks who shop at Whole Foods (aka Whole Paycheck) are already relatively price insensitive compared to people who shop elsewhere. Instacart was such a good match for WF because it's the same demographic of people who are willing to pay a lot for convenience. Your average Publix shopper is likely to be much more price sensitive.