Do You Use Self-Serve at the Grocery Store?
I rarely use self-serve at the grocery store.
The Original Piggly-Wiggly in Memphis, Tennessee, the First Self-Service Grocery Store
I know it’s a generational thing. I know that some people prefer checking their own groceries and getting out the door to waiting in line for a cashier.
I know that the first President Bush was famously ridiculed for not knowing that cashiers scanned prices in instead of keying them into a cash register because it had been so long since he’d done his own grocery shopping.
In political terms, this meant he was out-of-touch with average Americans and he suffered for it.
But, he just hit the intersection of the relatively new scanners and typing in prices on cash registers. It’s not hard to hit those intersections.
When Did Self-Checkout Terminals Become Popular?
Introduced in 1987, but not widespread until 2000, there were 92,600 self-checkout terminals worldwide in 2008.
Although this number was projected to grow to 430,000 units by 2014, some major retailers are now taking them out of their stores.
Theft, customer dissatisfaction and anticipation of new technology, like scanning with smart phones, are cited as among the reasons for the withdrawal of the machines.
How Could Anyone Not Like the Convenience and Speed of Self-Checkout?
I’ve noticed little things that make me reluctant to use self-checkout terminals:
- Fresh foods that have no bar code on them
- Bar codes that don’t scan at all
- The machine scanning the wrong price on an item
- Figuring out how to recover if it seems it didn’t scan and you end up scanning twice
- Switching from scanning to finding the picture of an item on the screen to select
- The warnings from the machine if you don’t bag the items you’ve just scanned, since it compares the weight of the item in its database with the item on the belt.
It’s been a long time since I’ve been carded, so clerks don’t stop me when I buy wine.
Our grocery store now places clerks near the self-serve scanners.
If they notice anyone having trouble, or, if you just look up with a question on your face, they are right by your side to help.
Apparently, I’m not the only one that sometimes needs help.
Transactions using self-serve checkout were down to 16% of all transactions where this was an option in 2010, compared to 22% three years before.
The History of the Grocery Store
The self-serve grocery store, or supermarket, was a concept developed by an American, Clarence Saunders, in 1916, and patented in 1917 for his Piggly-Wiggly stores.
Before that, food was kept behind a counter and retrieved by clerks.
When I lived in Argentina in 1975-76, the counter and clerk model was the most common kind of market.
Supermarkets were just starting to take hold there.
Do Customers Care About the Social Aspects of Cashiers?
Just as with the transition to self-serve checkout, the clerk and counter arrangement was slower and more social than its supermarket replacement, and, similarly, more expensive because of the cost of labor.
I am a quiet person and had to take a class to learn how to start a conversation with a stranger, even though I’ve been doing my own grocery shopping since I was 21.
After my conversation starter class, I started practicing on cashiers at the grocery store. My son was so startled when I first started doing this he asked what I was doing.
“I’m practicing making small talk with people I don’t know. It’s a good skill to have and I need to learn how.
He is now a skilled speaker and host.
But, most people must not be as quiet as I am because social interaction is one of the reasons customers cite for preferring cashiers.
Self-serve checkout is still cheaper than having clerks at every cash register, because clerks designated to help shoppers can cover four to six self-serve terminals at once.
But, I’m willing to wait the three minutes in line to have a cashier do it all.
Do You Check Out at the Self-Serve or with a Cashier at the Grocery Store?
- Cashier (100%, 3 Votes)
- Self-Serve Check-out Terminal (0%, 0 Votes)
- Individual Bar Code Scanner As I Shop (0%, 0 Votes)
- Smart Phone (0%, 0 Votes)
- Other (0%, 0 Votes)
Total Voters: 3
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Do you prefer having someone to talk to when you check out?
Is speed or predictability more important?
How about your children?
To you and making life simpler for your grandchildren.
Carol Covin, “Granny-Guru”
Author, Who Gets to Name Grandma? The Wisdom of Mothers and Grandmothers
http://newgrandmas.com
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5 Comments
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“One clerk can handle four to six self service terminals” Pshaw! One clerk holds up four to six terminals, hopping like a jumping bean. The problem is too many terminals on each server.
At Harris Teeter, the manager comes sprinting over when he sees me coming, at Giant there is a five minute hold time to see if you and the computer can create a solution together, and at Safeway I had a clerk explode about how Walmart shouldn’t be coming to Washington. (I figure different planet?)
Lifehacker pointed out that when choosing a line, the biggest time sink is starting a new customer, so don’t notice the load in the carts, concentrate on total number of carts in each line.
So, the 4-6 terminals may be aspirational or delusional. To be sure, my local Giant positions a dedicated clerk in the aisle in front of three self-serve terminals, so they are only a step away if you need them, but this is a recent addition, and, for all the reasons I listed, I still don’t use them anyway. Those stores where the clerks are midway between the ends of several belts, trying to keep an eye out for those who need help, take a lot longer because they have to stop doing whatever they’re doing, decide whether you need help or not from a distance, then come over. But, I like people who figure out what is really more efficient. So, if start time for a new customer is the time sink, counting carts really makes a difference. Thanks!
I never use them unless i only have one or two items. They make me feel stupid, because i find myself talking back to them when something goes wrong. I’d rather wait and let it be the clerks problem to figure out hoe to ring things up.
Talking back to the self-serve machines. You’re cute, Nannette. Technology that makes you feel stupid, which technology does naturally unless the designers pay a lot of attention to how the technology will be used, is bad technology or a poor introduction to it. You’re not stupid. It’s poor design.
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