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Shops return to rural Sweden but are now staff-free

bbc.co.uk

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Re: Shops return to rural Sweden but are now staff-free

#141

Post by wasmitnetzen »

bryanrasmussen wrote: post #75
SamuelAdams wrote: post #36

I used to work at a major multi-billion dollar retailer. One of the biggest complaints from customers was waiting at the check out line, especially for small, quick orders. This is the future of grocery stores, like it or not. Employees are expensive and make mistakes, whereas machines are cheap, don't take breaks, and work pretty reliably once you set them up correctly.

machines implement stupid broken ux patterns which make shopping hell. on edit: evidently people would like their supermarket checkout experience to be as pleasing as the typical online shopping experience, thus a quick downvote.

I never experienced that "Unexpected item in bagging area" here in Sweden, the UX failures are not universal.

Most stores I visited don't even have scales and just trust you to put in the correct items. Especially the ones where you get a handheld device to scan while you walk trough the store. I would guess that fraud levels are much lower here so the stores don't need to do that.

Re: Shops return to rural Sweden but are now staff-free

#142

Post by mrweasel »

WhompingWindows wrote: post #126
mrweasel wrote: post #63

I believe Sweden has pretty good policing, and the Swedes are just about as honest as you could ever expect a nation to be, but if this was in "rural" Denmark and someone decided to raid the store, there would be very little stopping them. Police is in many cases at least 30 minutes away, if not more, and have no resources to investigate the theft of 10L of milk. In many cases the staff is a store is just as much pre…

I'm not sure that'd be a solid strategy. You have to scan your ID to get into the store. So just to raid for a 10L of milk, you'd have to then break and enter, not just steal the milk. The store is probably riddled with cameras and, with the low population density, there's not a great chance you can get away with breaking and entering, much less stealing.

Currently no one would think twice about a masked person entering a store, so I'm not sure about the usefulness of the cameras.

I would like to see how secure the entry points really are, because I doubt it a lock.

Re: Shops return to rural Sweden but are now staff-free

#143

Post by rootsudo »

qmmmur wrote: post #133
random_upvoter wrote: post #104

I worked in a supermarket for a while and there was plenty of old people who came to that shop almost daily just to interact with another human being.

What's your point? That people should be indentured in low paying jobs to be old people's friends?

People aren't indentured to work in Sweden. They don't have to work and have choice of where to work.

It's also nice, to talk to people, instead of talking down to them.

Re: Shops return to rural Sweden but are now staff-free

#145

Post by dtech »

random_upvoter wrote: post #104

I worked in a supermarket for a while and there was plenty of old people who came to that shop almost daily just to interact with another human being.

I would recon that isn't a problem in small rural communities, especially if the alternative they have now is no shops.

Re: Shops return to rural Sweden but are now staff-free

#146

Post by sokoloff »

paganel wrote: post #107
chrisseaton wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I enjoy the interaction with the employees. If you want to pay for someone to be social with you why not do that separately to shopping? Seems funny to try to mix the two.

It's not only that, it's the fact that the stores have externalised the checkout process to customers themselves. I could never understood why should I, as a client, do the work that someone else can do for me (and more reliably, of course)? It's win-win, I'm not stressed at doing something wrong, I can do something else while my products are checked out and that person doing the product checkout also has a job. But…

Analogously, I don't see a reason why I should be forced wait in a queue for one of the limited other humans to help me do something that I can do myself in one of the 8 self-checkout lanes whenever I'm ready to do so.

People who want the assistance of an employee can go that route, but I prefer the self-checkout process for the reduced waiting and self-service nature.

Re: Shops return to rural Sweden but are now staff-free

#147

Post by Ygg2 »

qmmmur wrote: post #133
random_upvoter wrote: post #104

I worked in a supermarket for a while and there was plenty of old people who came to that shop almost daily just to interact with another human being.

What's your point? That people should be indentured in low paying jobs to be old people's friends?

That there is more than one facet even something as simple as a shop? Kinda like chatting with a Cab Driver.

Re: Shops return to rural Sweden but are now staff-free

#148

Post by kqr »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #138
the-dude wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My favorite supermarket has regular and 'quick' checkouts. I enjoy the interaction with the employees.

I love the quick self service checkouts and will line up for them even when a regular staffed checkout is free. I’m just the opposite and instead dislike interaction I guess.

One implicit benefit of the self-service checkouts is that there's often one line for multiple machines. Any student of queuing theory will know how much this reduces waiting time compared to the one queue per cashier that's otherwise common.

Re: Shops return to rural Sweden but are now staff-free

#150

Post by lawxls »

qmmmur wrote: post #133
random_upvoter wrote: post #104

I worked in a supermarket for a while and there was plenty of old people who came to that shop almost daily just to interact with another human being.

What's your point? That people should be indentured in low paying jobs to be old people's friends?

Isn't people work at these jobs because there's no other options available for them?
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