Documents reveal that Whole Foods is leaving some shelves empty on purpose • Hacker News Board

Re: Documents reveal that Whole Foods is leaving some shelves empty on purpose

#31

Post by ghshephard » Sat, Jan 20, 2018, 7:33 PM UTC

AmVess wrote: post #28

saas_co_de wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have never seen an empty shelf in any major brand store. The idea is insane. Especially for a store targeting an upmarket clientele with high prices.

It gives the store a scruffy, downmarket image. Also, it removes convenience. If I cannot get all the items on my list at a single store, then I will immediately stop going to that store...likely to never return. Companies have been trying to reinvent the grocery store for decades now. What can be done has already been done, and now they are trying to alter the way their customers shop. Guess what! That doesn't work.…

" If I cannot get all the items on my list at a single store, then I will immediately stop going to that store."

You've got it completely backwards - this new policy is designed for you - the goal is to ensure they always keep product in stock, and the "holes" are a forcing function. Previously WF would just put something else in place, thereby reducing the pressure to restock. Now, the goal is to quickly as possible, ensure they have everything available.

Re: Documents reveal that Whole Foods is leaving some shelves empty on purpose

#32

Post by DashRattlesnake » Sat, Jan 20, 2018, 7:34 PM UTC

userbinator wrote: post #2

Personally, 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.

I'd prefer they just put up a sign saying "sorry, we're out of bananas" and putting something else there in the interim. The employees are right: empty shelves look sloppy. Too many and the place even looks like it's going out of business.

Re: Documents reveal that Whole Foods is leaving some shelves empty on purpose

#33

Post by DashRattlesnake » Sat, Jan 20, 2018, 7:35 PM UTC

saas_co_de wrote: post #23

userbinator wrote: post #2

Personally, 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.

I have never seen an empty shelf in any major brand store. The idea is insane. Especially for a store targeting an upmarket clientele with high prices.

I have recently, in Sears.

Retail protip: don't be like Sears.

Re: Documents reveal that Whole Foods is leaving some shelves empty on purpose

#34

Post by joejerryronnie » Sat, Jan 20, 2018, 7:35 PM UTC

uniacid wrote: post #19

Funny how walmart (neighborhood stores) never seems to have this problem? at least that's what I see locally.. it's always stocked for the most part unless say we have a Hurricane coming our way!

Walmart has built the most effective logistics system in the world. It's one of their most important competitive advantages.

Side note: Certainly Amazon is also very effective at logistics but I see that as almost a different use case than Walmart - i.e. centralized vs decentralized systems

Re: Documents reveal that Whole Foods is leaving some shelves empty on purpose

#35

Post by caseysoftware » Sat, Jan 20, 2018, 7:37 PM UTC

AmVess wrote: post #28

saas_co_de wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have never seen an empty shelf in any major brand store. The idea is insane. Especially for a store targeting an upmarket clientele with high prices.

It gives the store a scruffy, downmarket image. Also, it removes convenience. If I cannot get all the items on my list at a single store, then I will immediately stop going to that store...likely to never return. Companies have been trying to reinvent the grocery store for decades now. What can be done has already been done, and now they are trying to alter the way their customers shop. Guess what! That doesn't work.…

Whether they "re-face" a shelf with another item or leave it empty, you're not going to get the item on your list. This policy is a wash in that regard.

Alternatively, if staff can glance at a shelf and know what to reorder more easily and customers know exactly where to find something every time, that seems like a win for you and them.

Re: Documents reveal that Whole Foods is leaving some shelves empty on purpose

#36

Post by batbomb » Sat, Jan 20, 2018, 7:42 PM UTC

ams6110 wrote: post #3

Kroger 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…

Ordering is basically based on velocity and grocery items usually come in 3 times a week. You can tell the manager though. Sometimes the issue is actually that they do have some backstock that hasn't come out, it widely varies from store to store. In fact, they are encouraged to have zero backstock for this exact reason, because the more you have that you haven't gone through, the more likely it is that your shelf count is off. In any case, if you wrote to Kroger they're likely to fix the issue.

Unfortunately, they tend to be a bit harsh in punishment for this sort of thing, it depends.

Re: Documents reveal that Whole Foods is leaving some shelves empty on purpose

#37

Post by mindcrime » Sat, Jan 20, 2018, 7:42 PM UTC

If you live by just-in-time-inventory, you will die by just-in-time-inventory.

It's one of those things that sounds good on paper, and can work, but it's damn hard to get right in real-life. The JIT model assumes you have the necessary data and models to predict when things need to be ordered, how long they'll take to be shipped out by the supplier, how long they'll take to arrive, etc. In reality, there are a LOT of variables that you can't (or at least "didn't") account for in your model.

It probably makes sense to start the system running with the parameters configured to allow a little more back stock in order to avoid outages, and slowly tweak it to get closer and closer to "pure" JIT. And even then, you need a way to account for abnormal circumstances like a snow-storm in Florida, or other "that just doesn't happen" scenarios.

Probably Whole Foods will eventually get their system tuned well enough to avoid the major problems, but it does take time to get it right.

Re: Documents reveal that Whole Foods is leaving some shelves empty on purpose

#38

Post by trentmb » Sat, Jan 20, 2018, 7:47 PM UTC

bri3d wrote: post #7

Stock/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.

Wouldnt a scale work?

Re: Documents reveal that Whole Foods is leaving some shelves empty on purpose

#39

Post by PeterisP » Sat, Jan 20, 2018, 7:47 PM UTC

quadrangle wrote: post #20

uniacid wrote: post #19

Funny how walmart (neighborhood stores) never seems to have this problem? at least that's what I see locally.. it's always stocked for the most part unless say we have a Hurricane coming our way!

this isn't a problem that stores have or not, it's just a corporate policy: when a product sells out, do you fill the shelf with something or leave it empty? People have different opinions on the pros and cons here. But it's not like Walmart always has every single product in stock 100% of the time, that would be super unlikely. If you never see empty shelves, then they just are using the "put something on the shelf"…

It is a problem that stores have or not - some stores have situations where bananas or lettuce are sold out only in exceptional cases i.e. basically never, while others have to decide on a corporate policy on what to do because that's a common occurrence.

Re: Documents reveal that Whole Foods is leaving some shelves empty on purpose

#40

Post by sjg007 » Sat, Jan 20, 2018, 7:50 PM UTC

dawnerd wrote: post #14

ams6110 wrote: post #3

Kroger 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…

I have noticed they’ve been pretty bad about keeping certain things in stock. Their soda isle is probably the worst, almost always picked clean.

It seems strange not to have a back stock of soda.. that stuff never spoils. Maybe it’s a space issue. Same with dry or canned goods. Produce should be cheap enough at wholesale to have some spoilage and they also have these seconds supermarkets that take not quite perfect fresh food and close to expiration date foods. I’d open another store selling those.