Ridiculous things shops do

[jon0844]

Oh, no doubt empty shelves are a problem. But re-merchandising is aimed more at the weekly shopper than the 'grab one thing and go' person - they're going to be in the supermarket for a while anyway, so moving items around to catch their eye pays off over all.

I think for some years now that supermarkets know moving things around regularly to keep people on their toes and make them see new things (products) is unpopular.. so it's usually only done with some big refurbishment and replacement of equipment like fridges and freezers.

It has been explained well above why other things move around a bit as product lines change based on sales, availability and other factors.

For those who use hand scanners/apps, I've noticed some now let you search for an item and it will then tell you exactly where it is. That's really useful for items you may not regularly buy and had no clue where it was even before a later change (and yet I bet I'd forget next time I look for something!).

 

[Pinza-C55]

I bought a packet of Starburst from Tesco yesterday and the bag seemed to be made of military grade plastic which was impossible to tear so I had to bite through it and even that took a bit of doing. Another local Tesco has only card self service machines and the staff are usually stacking shelves so you either have to use your card or wait till they come over looking harassed to serve you.

 

[Busaholic]

Well, I routinely don’t use a trolley in the interest of efficiency and economy in the use of such resources and I’ve never had an issue.

It isn’t your place to enforce imaginary rules, and getting a trolley specifically to do that is rather bizarre.

At my local Sainsbury's there are two entrances, both with trolley parks outside. The one nearest to the Disabled Parking Spots regularly has none of the newer, less deep ones outside it, and sometimes the other entrance doesn't too. On the other hand, there are always literally dozens of the capacious trolleys which I personally could not begin to use, neither can I use a basket owing to needing a stick. I can just about get by with carrying a shopping bag if I'm only after one or two items, though I always seem to end up buying more, which I'm sure Sainsbury's is pleased about. If they or any other supermarket attempted to implement an obligatory basket/trolley policy without attending to these shortcomings I'd be having my tuppenceworth.

 

[LSWR Cavalier]

There is a lot of psychology that goes into a shop layout. It's a very interesting subject. There are various reasons why shops constantly move shelves around but I'll go through a few of the main ones that have the greatest impact.

1. Promotions. The end of an aisle or some kind of 'dump bin' with goods dumped in are all about the promotion. This is actually good for the customer because they are there to save money. Yes, there is some market manipulation, and yes, its not often the best deal, but if you just looked at the aisle ends you can cherry pick your shopping and save confusion about what is or isn't included in the promotion.

2. Seasonal. Yep, Christmas is coming and its time to be hit in the face with seasonal goods. When I worked in a shop, we spent most of our time pepping and moving the store about for each seasonal event. Not even just the main events. The amount of shop space that goes over to Valentines is pretty immense. Everyone is in on it too. Your deodorants will suddenly get a new package with a heart on it, meals for two, and even heart shaped crumpets !

3. Brand awareness. One of the most restrictive things that happens in retail is how the brands control the in store space. There is a lot of money that goes into where they sit on the shelf and how much linear footage is given to a specific brand. One of the reasons why you see that bottle of Coke and Pepsi in the fridge is because they pay a metric ton of cash to be there. At one store I worked in had the fridge donated to us by Coca-Cola and every single product in that fridge had to be one of theirs, without exception. Proctor and Gamble are another dominant force, the amount of retail space they have is truly insane. They pay ludicrous amounts for the most visible spaces on the shelves. They also decide how many facings of each of their flavours they want. When they say jump, you better jump. If they put out a new flavour, it's coming with a promotional end, full range price drop and a mid shelf topper. The worst is when they change the bottle sizes. Those days made me cry.

Yep, its a huge drive to generate revenue but a lot more goes on behind the scenes than just the stores moving things about.

The handful of retailers surely have a lot of power too, and can offer own brand products much cheaper: Goliath against Goliath?

I like the slogan used by one food retailer: "try something new today".

 

[ComUtoR]

The handful of retailers surely have a lot of power too, and can offer own brand products much cheaper: Goliath against Goliath?

Competing on price is great but you are putting your own stock, on your own shelves. The income is minimal in comparison. Stores are not only getting income on the money paid on an in-store promotion or on brand placement; they are getting footfall generated by that brand.

Sheryl is on the tellybox this week promoting a vitamin brand. That generates interest. When your walking down the highstreet or through the shopping mall, you will see her face plastered all over the front window VM (visual merchandising) and the product pretty close to the door. It draws the customer in.

Then you hit them with a similar product priced cheaper.

Boots No7 works as it's is a huge brand in itself so can draw a customer base. Difficult to sell Boots own brand vitamins but a Wellman 3-4-2 will pull the in and might grab an additional sale from the boots own range. Boots are pretty good at dropping a red ticket sale to do exactly what you mention.

What also happens back of house is the retailer gets a discount on the product so they will bulk buy it in at a discounted rate.

I remember our annual pepsi promotion. It was a can of pepsi for 19p. We would buy cases and cases of it because the second the promotion ran out we would benefit from the huge price hike as well as getting the promotional credit.

 

[_toommm_]

The sweets seem to be discontinued, but the lemonade is still for sale. My local has 5 bottles left at 23p each of the Stockwell stuff.

Some supermarkets are in dispute with the manufacturer of those sweets. It’s fair to assume most use the same manufacturer for own-brand products, so that’s what it will be.

 

[DelayRepay]

Why do supermarkets not call cleaners, cleaners? Tonight in Tesco someone spilt some milk, and they announced over the tannoy that they needed the Housekeeper.

 

[Kite159]

I remember my local Tesco doing a big changearound of the stock location during mid 2020, when they still had the one way system in place.

Quite annoying to head to the area the products were previously located to have to hunt it down along another aisle.

 

[neilmc]

My wife and I went shopping to Kendal Morrisons, she needed some paracetemol and I needed some ibuprofen for a toothache. Because we had two packs of each, the store wouldn't sell us one lot as they contravened the maximum number of packs of painkillers allowed to be bought at one time (two). So I left my wife to pay for the main shopping, went down to the self-service till with just the ibuprofen packs and put them through separately. Fair enough, they didn't want to contravene government sidelines.

 

[Busaholic]

My wife and I went shopping to Kendal Morrisons, she needed some paracetemol and I needed some ibuprofen for a toothache. Because we had two packs of each, the store wouldn't sell us one lot as they contravened the maximum number of packs of painkillers allowed to be bought at one time (two). So I left my wife to pay for the main shopping, went down to the self-service till with just the ibuprofen packs and put them through separately. Fair enough, they didn't want to contravene government sidelines.

I was in a Boots yesterday and had to wait to see the pharmacist. A fellow of mature years came to the counter with two packs of 16 paracetemol tablets and asked the assistant if there were any cheaper ones. She replied that buying a packet of 32 carried behind the counter would be cheaper, and so he agreed to that, then she asked ''how many packets would you like?'' He seemed surprised, and asked how many tablets could be bought in one transaction. The reply was '100' i.e. 3 packets x 32 or 6x16: must say that was news to me, but it appears true of paracetamol and aspirin at least.

 

[66701GBRF]

Mostly irritating. Have people go any examples.

For me.

The time honoured habit of moving products around in the supermarket. Waste my time eh - so I will find the most senior person I can to take me to the right place.

Last few years I have noticed the absence of opening hours listed in the window. One shop had them on a pillar inside the store - not readable if the store is shut.

Labels saying "Temporarily out of stock" covering the normal product label showing the product description and price. What a waste of information. If the shelf is empty I can guess that the product on the description is out of stock - not only that but I can guess it is a temporary problem because the normal label is still there. Where it gets really frustrating is when you are looking for a product you do not know the exact location of. The shelf edge labels are hard enough to read but to hide them behind pointless information just makes my search harder. What a waste of effort for customers and staff.

Today I encountered.

Boots. Sandwiches - every shelf product label had a temporarily out of stock label covering the normal label. That was all sandwiches. Guess what, the shelves were almost full of sandwiches. I wanted to know the price of one but each product was in the wrong place so it took a lot of peeling back said over information to find the information I wanted !.

Superdrug. I wandered in looking for a drink. I noticed that the checkouts had moved again and the drinks had gone. The checkouts used to be along the open side into our shopping centre. The checkouts then got moved and grouped to force a single file queue that passes all the incidental things you do not need to buy. Today the checkouts had vanished. I eventually found them in the diagonally opposite corner furthest from the ext. Wow what is the most likely thing a customer is going to do straight after they have paid ?.

W.H.Smith. Now I have moaned before about the fact that two of the three entrances are locked shut, the lights inside are dim and so many people think the shop is shut. Furthermore I could not see any opening times. Well today I found the list of opening times hurrah - but. They were on the automatic sliding door at the very bottom. As I approached the sign the door opened automatically and the sign disappeared behind a poster in the adjacent window !.

quick point. The ‘out of stock‘ labels usually mean there is no stock at the store rather than the shelf being empty because they haven’t got around to refilling it.

 

[zaax]

Shops which locate the mens clothing department as far as possible away from the entrance, so that we have to waste time passing through areas for which we have zero interest, and are never going to buy anything.

Thats most of them including Marks and Spencer and Primark

 

[pdeaves]

Thats most of them including Marks and Spencer and Primark

Presumably the lady shoppers are the ones they want to attract through the door.

 

[Hadders]

I was in a Boots yesterday and had to wait to see the pharmacist. A fellow of mature years came to the counter with two packs of 16 paracetemol tablets and asked the assistant if there were any cheaper ones. She replied that buying a packet of 32 carried behind the counter would be cheaper, and so he agreed to that, then she asked ''how many packets would you like?'' He seemed surprised, and asked how many tablets could be bought in one transaction. The reply was '100' i.e. 3 packets x 32 or 6x16: must say that was news to me, but it appears true of paracetamol and aspirin at least.

More tablets can be purchased at a pharmacy than in a retail store.

 

[Ediswan]

More tablets can be purchased at a pharmacy than in a retail store.

True, but that appears to be store policy, based on government advice, rather than law.

I looked up the 100 limit @Busaholic mentioned. This from the MHRA:
Best practice guidance on the sale of medicines for pain relief

* Don’t sell more than two packs in any one transaction

What does the law say?
The maximum pack size for pain relief medicines in a general sale outlet is 16
tablets or capsules. A pharmacy may sell larger packs containing up to 32
tablets or capsules under the supervision of a pharmacist. It is illegal to sell
more than 100 tablets or capsules of either paracetamol or aspirin in any one
retail transaction.

The only distinction there between a general sale outlet and a pharmacy is pack size.

 

[Hadders]

True, but that appears to be store policy, based on government advice, rather than law.

Indeed but if a reputable retailer doesn’t follow this sort of Government guidance there is a serious risk of brand damage.

 

[SouthernR]

Argos touch screens -
When searching for a product the screen will display 4 items at a time. (This could be useful - I wanted some batteries.) However, I found it impossible to scroll through the list. It would only display one of the 4 items (that I didn't want) in greater detail.
I managed to find what I wanted by using the word search to limit the number of items displayed, but still managed to order twice as many as I wanted.

One wonders how much testing is done on these non-critical MMI systems, using "customers" rather than people already familiar with the system.
Websites are generally even worse, given the different devices that we use. However, at least we can get annoyed in the comfort of our own homes.

 

[Ediswan]

Indeed but if a reputable retailer doesn’t follow this sort of Government guidance there is a serious risk of brand damage.

It is sensible guidance. I don't recall any campaigns against it, or to have it relaxed.

Anecdote: I used to work with, and visit, the US. When deaths due to accidental paracetamol overdose were headline news in the UK, US colleagues said not a problem there as they don't use paracetamol. Sometime later, the main item on the US TV morning news was deaths due to accidental acetaminophen overdose.

Spoiler: Explanation

(Same thing, different names.)

 

[Jamesrob637]

Hike prices to ridiculous levels.

 

[AM9]

True, but that appears to be store policy, based on government advice, rather than law.

I looked up the 100 limit @Busaholic mentioned. This from the MHRA:
Best practice guidance on the sale of medicines for pain relief


The only distinction there between a general sale outlet and a pharmacy is pack size.

The biggest irony is that Costco also limits sales of asprin and paracetamol to the recommended 32 per member per visit. If however the membership is fo an organisation be it shop, decorator or stamp club, there is no limit!

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 30 Oct 2022 ==

Trying to flog you something extra at the checkout

‘Want some chocolate for a quid?!’
‘Want a lottery for tonight?!’
etc

Haven’t used Argos in years but they used to ask if I wanted insurance and put it on a high APR Argos credit card for literally every electrical purchase even as low as £20!

Online is the sane experience I guess but it’s a lot easier to say no to a computer screen than a poor member of staff trying to hit their targets!

I can't understand customers having any problem saying no (politely of course) to staff offering something that they don't want.

 

[DelayRepay]

I can't understand customers having any problem saying no (politely of course) to staff offering something that they don't want.

There was a woman who worked in a shop near my old office, who always used to ask 'Do you want any stamps or phonecards?'. None of the other staff asked, so it was presumably not store policy. It was easy enough to say no, but I wonder how many people actually did want stamps or phonecards who wouldn't think to ask for them?

 

[jon0844]

Thats most of them including Marks and Spencer and Primark

I think most fashion retailers know the bulk of customers are female, with a lot of males only visiting through necessity! Thinking back to when I was young, I used to be much more into buying clothes and shoes, but also was quite specific about what stores I went to.

 

[LSWR Cavalier]

There are lots of articles explaining the tricks retailers use to try to get people to buy more.

But male and female brains are quite different, is that taken into account?

I just want to grab my stuff, whether food or underwear*, and get out but women might like to spin out the shopping experience.

* except in a bookshop, I might spend more time there.

 

[Bletchleyite]

There are lots of articles explaining the tricks retailers use to try to get people to buy more.

But male and female brains are quite different, is that taken into account?

I just want to grab my stuff, whether food or underwear*, and get out but women might like to spin out the shopping experience.

* except in a bookshop, I might spend more time there.

Curiously my Mum and Dad are the wrong way round on this definition. He shops like a stereotypical woman and enjoys the experience, she gets in and out as quickly as possible.

 

[Falcon1200]

Shops which locate the mens clothing department as far as possible away from the entrance, so that we have to waste time passing through areas for which we have zero interest, and are never going to buy anything.

This policy can lead to embarrassing situations, such as a group of priests getting lost in the largest lingerie department in Ireland (not sure it would bother me quite as much....)

Supermarkets move stuff round all the time, it is quite deliberate.

The WH Smith I use in Oxford city centre recently shifted all their magazines around, which annoyed me and did not make me buy anything else!
(But at least it might deter those who see the shop as a reading room and stand blocking a purchaser's access to the products).

 

[joncombe]

Having to ask to be let out if not buying anything. I remember Toys R Us bring like that before it closed. You had to go through a one way barrier to get in then the only exit was via the tills, with the tills not in use blocked by a barrier, which set off an alarm if pushed. So you had to go to the far end of the tills to customer service to be let out. I've seen some supermarkets in parts of Europe that are similar.

Similar shops with a one way route. I think IKEA still does that?

 

[AM9]

As an aside, why is it socially acceptable (even if not desirable) to ask tall people to help reach high shelves, but socially unacceptable to ask short people to help reach low shelves?

Because short people stand on the same floor that tall people do, so there's significant no difference the the level to which a hand goes with respect to their body.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 30 Oct 2022 ==

Having to ask to be let out if not buying anything. I remember Toys R Us bring like that before it closed. You had to go through a one way barrier to get in then the only exit was via the tills, with the tills not in use blocked by a barrier, which set off an alarm if pushed. So you had to go to the far end of the tills to customer service to be let out. I've seen some supermarkets in parts of Europe that are similar.

Similar shops with a one way route. I think IKEA still does that?

On the few occasions that I've had that, I just push through the alarmed barrier. No shop has a right to prevent anybody walking out, (it would invalidate their fire certification anyway). I've never been challenged when the alarm goes off, but I refuse to queue to leave a shop.

 

[cb a1]

Put my back out a couple of years ago. Went to Tesco to get back pain medication. It was all on the bottom shelf which was extremely difficult to get down to.
I did tweet about it and to be fair to them the following week it had all been moved to a much higher shelf.

 

[52290]

Indeed but if a reputable retailer doesn’t follow this sort of Government guidance there is a serious risk of brand damage.

What is the government guidance on Viz magazine? The red light always flashes when I try to buy one in Morrisons, I blame Eight Ace. It doesn't happen with Private Eye.

 

[Typhoon]

The risk is my visits are infrequent enough that too many moves have occurred since the last time I visited.

The trick is to leave it longer and everything will be back where it was originally!!

My irritation is when they are out of stock of an item, and they spread stock of the adjacent item into the empty space (rather than leave it empty) so there are two shelf labels under the stock. Fair enough, if they are at the same price but, often, they are not, so you then have to interpret the code on the shelf label to find which label applies to the item on the shelf.

Ridiculously small price cuts. I have seen an offer bread (I think it was) offer reduced from 80p to 79p. Currently eggs £2.29 to £2.25. Hardly worth the effort

Having to 'opt in' for a paper receipt but not being able to opt out of finding (again) that they price check some item I never buy with one of the German supermarkets, or I can get a few quid off my first on-line grocery shop over £60 when I spend somewhere between £8 and £15 each time I shop simply because I can't carry that much from the bus stop to the front door (a 30 minute walk).