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Aldi's Barcode Strategy

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Re: Aldi's Barcode Strategy

#101

Post by mdip »

I've been an Aldi fan for more than a decade, buying almost all of my family's groceries there (four kids, it's cheap and doesn't require figuring out what is really on sale this week vs. what is really over-priced this week, or messing with Coupons). The quality of most of their products meets or exceeds that of the name brands[1] except in a few circumstances (their equivalents to Cheerios and Frosted Mini Wheats are very sub-par, but in the case of the Cheerios, they're about half the price for a much larger box, so we mix 'em).

I actually get a little stressed when I arrive with a cart full of groceries and an empty line -- they ring them up at about twice the speed I can pull them off the cart.

The Aldi process is very well thought out. They're the only cashiers I've seen that sit in a chair while ringing things up. They needn't move, nearly at all, beyond swiping things past the register to read those giant barcodes (on anything store branded, which is most things). I remarked to the cashier about their ridiculous speed and was informed they are also tracked, directly, on their speed and have targets to meet (and incentives if they're "the fastest").

[1] Their produce is consistently good (love the sweet, small, green grapes) and their Frozen Chicken Nuggets are better tasting than any I've purchased, including the organic ones at Costco.

Re: Aldi's Barcode Strategy

#102

Post by shostack »

mdip wrote: post #101

I've been an Aldi fan for more than a decade, buying almost all of my family's groceries there (four kids, it's cheap and doesn't require figuring out what is really on sale this week vs. what is really over-priced this week, or messing with Coupons). The quality of most of their products meets or exceeds that of the name brands[1] except in a few circumstances (their equivalents to Cheerios and Frosted Mini Wheats a…

The sitting thing is common in England (and perhaps elsewhere in Europe). It definitely stood out to me when I was visiting.

Re: Aldi's Barcode Strategy

#103

Post by joshvm »

noipv4 wrote: post #3

I wonder if this system can introduce miscounting or double-counting of an item? Maybe that is why the cashier at Aldi moves through items so quickly.

Given the way that barcode scanners work, as the sibling comment points out, there is almost certainly some kind of 'debouncing' going on. The system is acquiring data fast enough that it probably has enough time to repeatedly read the code tens or even hundreds of times before you move it out of the field of view. So I'd guess it triggers on the first detection and you get a short dead time to move the product away.

Re: Aldi's Barcode Strategy

#104

Post by colinbartlett »

makomk wrote: post #26

Occasionally they incorporate the barcode into the artwork a little too, like on this hair shampoo: http://imgur.com/jx5COyD (There's another longer barcode segment on the other side as well.)

If you enjoy this sort of curiosity, checkout https://reddit.com/r/barcodeporn

Re: Aldi's Barcode Strategy

#105

Post by wirrbel »

athenot wrote: post #33
germanier wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> in the order that they should go in the bag That's one of them. Even that is something that you don't usually do outside Germany. To get to the next level I recommend to put weighted produce to the end or just after items that are not straightforward to pack.

I do that in the US even where they have an employee bagging my stuff. In fact, I do that to ensure optimal packetization—for an IP analogy. :) Otherwise I end up with 2 pieces of fruit in 1 bag, 1 bottle of soap by itself in another bag, followed by again more fruit in the 3rd bag… It's a fun fragmentation problem.

As a german in the US, I suddenly felt as if I had a OCD about the way to bag stuff. Store employees were more or less dumping things kind of randomly in bags without sorting by weight and by robustnes of the product. On the other hand declinining help with bagging seemed to be kind of unusual.

Other differences I noticed: Time at checkouts was at least 2-3 times longer than in Germany, even at the better german supermarkets cashiers are much faster. Also, in Germany I never encountered cashiers to comment on the goods I bought (I don't mind much, but it still felt a bit like an intrusion in privacy. I once bought a glass of Ghee - a common ingredient in southern german cuisine - and the cashier went on and on about how unusual it was that a white guy would buy it).

Re: Aldi's Barcode Strategy

#107

Post by IneffablePigeon »

tuna-piano wrote: post #97

I wonder why a large retailer like Walmart doesn't start incentivizing their suppliers to do this as well? Some math. -Assume a fixed 120 customers an hour -Assume each customer buys 20 items -1 minute for customer to pay + 1 minute total scanning time for all items = 30 customers / cashier / hour (4 cashiers needed) -Assuming additional barcodes double the scanning time (seems reasonable to me from my experiences at…

The benefits only get really apparent when almost everything has easy to scan barcodes.

Also, presumably these suppliers will be supplying to competitors of Walmart, so it doesn't make sense for Walmart to fund their shared efficiency gains. Everyone would end up making the same gain, and Walmart wouldn't end up any further ahead of the competition.

Re: Aldi's Barcode Strategy

#108

Post by agentdrtran »

shostack wrote: post #102
mdip wrote: post #101

I've been an Aldi fan for more than a decade, buying almost all of my family's groceries there (four kids, it's cheap and doesn't require figuring out what is really on sale this week vs. what is really over-priced this week, or messing with Coupons). The quality of most of their products meets or exceeds that of the name brands[1] except in a few circumstances (their equivalents to Cheerios and Frosted Mini Wheats a…

The sitting thing is common in England (and perhaps elsewhere in Europe). It definitely stood out to me when I was visiting.

It's the standard in Germany as well, at least for grocery stores.

Re: Aldi's Barcode Strategy

#109

Post by wirrbel »

germanier wrote: post #85
open-source-ux wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Aldi and Lidl are blasting through other super market chains with their low cost, high quality goods" Yes, and no. In the UK, I'm glad that Aldi and Lidl are challenging the larger supermarkets, but I would hate to see a situation where a race to the bottom on price means consumers have less choice across the entire supermarket sector. By choice I don't mean 20 brands of ketchup, I mean - to give just one example -…

The race to the bottom in Germany has created a market where food is of good quality but not great. Larger supermarkets do have quite a bit of selection but it's not as good as the stuff you can get in a French or British store. You can get a fair selection of spices in stores other than Aldi or Lidl but sometimes I have the suspicion that it's only the third-class that is left after the stores in neighboring countri…

I hear this quite often, but on the other hand I live about 20km away from the french border, and overall food quality does not go up much if you go there (with the obvious exceptions: Cheese, Baguette, Wine).

Typically you can buy most items available in an Aldi store for the same price in other supermarkets (value brands).

Re: Aldi's Barcode Strategy

#110

Post by IneffablePigeon »

cm3 wrote: post #106

I've heard that in the UK there are bag boys who even carry it to your car. Is that true and are you then supposed to tip?

That's not true in any of the Aldis I've been in here. If it were true, I doubt anybody would tip them.

In the UK it would be considered very odd to tip anybody you're not already paying directly.

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