Documents reveal that Whole Foods is leaving some shelves empty on purpose
businessinsider.com
Documents reveal that Whole Foods is leaving some shelves empty on purpose
1–10 of 58 posts
Re: Documents reveal that Whole Foods is leaving some shelves empty on purpose
#2Personally, I'd prefer to see empty places where a product is sold out, than have to spend extra time coming to that conclusion by examining everything else nearby.
Re: Documents reveal that Whole Foods is leaving some shelves empty on purpose
#3Kroger seems to follow the same playbook from what I can see. Locally, they are often sold out of common produce such as lettuce. Even dry and canned goods are a crap shot. The other night I was looking for canned white beans and the entire shelf section was empty. It's frustrating. They are basically the only grocery option in the area and they do enough business to carry a little extra inventory. As it is now, if I happen to be in an area with another option I'll shop there. This is costing them some amount of business.
Re: Documents reveal that Whole Foods is leaving some shelves empty on purpose
#4Re: Documents reveal that Whole Foods is leaving some shelves empty on purpose
#5Reminds me of Soviet Russia. Bad central planning + strict bureaucratic rules & penalties causes empty store shelves.
Re: Documents reveal that Whole Foods is leaving some shelves empty on purpose
#6Personally, I'd prefer to see empty places where a product is sold out, than have to spend extra time coming to that conclusion by examining everything else nearby.
That's exactly the reason for this policy. One of many reasons, actually.
But it actually is meant for things on regular shelves, it doesn't apply to the produce department, which is what all the pictures in this terrible article show. It also doesn't apply if the product is going to be out-of-stock for a known period of time. It's meant for situations where the buyer didn't order enough and it will only be out for a day or two.
Re: Documents reveal that Whole Foods is leaving some shelves empty on purpose
#7Stock/inventory management seems like a great, although tough application for computer vision. A decent way to estimate how much broccoli is left without human intervention would facilitate automated ordering and eliminate rules like this one.
The title of the article is also misleading - they're not halting restocking of goods, they've just instructed employees not to patch over gaps with other products.
Re: Documents reveal that Whole Foods is leaving some shelves empty on purpose
#8The headline hints--to this non-industry reader--at a dark ulterior motive, like perhaps driving customer behavior by suggesting scarcity. But I would welcome a policy that leaves the cilantro shelf space empty rather than fill it with parsley.
Re: Documents reveal that Whole Foods is leaving some shelves empty on purpose
#9This is what happens when you mix data with people.
From what I can see you have top down management that wants to use data to make decisions. Those decisions affect people, the customers.
What few big data companies understand is that you cannot always approach things like this.
It does look sloppy, and it looks stupid. As a consumer I would go somewhere else.
Re: Documents reveal that Whole Foods is leaving some shelves empty on purpose
#10If I am reading this correctly - the idea is to ensure both employees and customers are aware something is out of stock items. Previously, OOS shelves were filled with another "high" selling item.
This sounds like a great and useful idea. Instead of confusing customers with another "high" selling item, it is better to have the shelf empty.
Though I am unsure of the policy on "temporary OOS" tags - Why not have it there?