Comment on Walmart, Costco and other companies rethink self-checkout, some stores removing them

• PRUSSIA_x86@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Having worked at a grocery store, it has to do with inventory stocking. All the trucks show up in the morning, so you need more people around to do intake and stock the shelves. Sometimes they go help in the front in the downtime. Despite what the antiwork folks say, most managers are not power mad assholes, they’re workers playing their role in the system. The owner class however…

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  • barsoap@lemm.ee ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    …so the truck drivers are also forced to get up early? Don’t let me down I want to be jaded today.

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    • PRUSSIA_x86@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      If you’re genuinely curious, a lot of it has to do with traffic management. I will blindly assume that you live near a large city in north america.

      Trucks are big and cumbersome, especially semis. They’re fine ok the highway, but on city roads around busy places like grocery stores they’re like one man traffic jams.

      Your typical American grocery store moves literal tons of product every single day, very little of which is produced locally. They require constant, daily replenishing, and it has to be done without disrupting the flow of shoppers and surrounding traffic.

      The solution is to start your night at a store or distribution center in a major city. Pick up your trailer of paper products or whatever, make your first stop in town, then hit the highway. Stop at towns and cities along the way, dropping off a pallet or two at each until you reach your final stop in another major city where you swap trailers and take a nap before doing it all again. Many grocery stores employ a small team of (frequently underpaid) workers to process all this at odd hours in the night.

      Supply chain is 24/7

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      • barsoap@lemm.ee ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

        So you mean the mad managers are actually sitting in urban design, not building public transit? Rush hour over here is when there’s enough cars on arterial streets so you can’t walk across them wherever you want, there’s no actual jams.

        dropping off a pallet or two at each

        That doesn’t sound very efficient, over here they consign full lorries at distribution centres to stock up one particular supermarket or two, or maybe half a lorry if it’s been a slow day and the supermarket didn’t get a delivery in the last what three days depends on what they’re missing (customers can survive one of five crisps flavours being out of stock, all toothpaste, not so much). The Swiss have it really nailed down, any business of any significant size over there has to have rail access so the likes of IKEA don’t put a single lorry on the road, and supermarket distribution centres receive containers on rail and then maybe send out lorries: If a village has a train station chances are the village supermarket is within forklift distance. They have absolutely no qualms about pulling a freight car or two with a small passenger train set.

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