It’s because they keep doing it wrong!
Nah, but known layout is better than unknown.
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Romesh Ranganathan did a comedy skit on this saying this and shitty wifi is what would tip him over to join ISIS
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tv7QNtzUqbw
at about 5:20
Yes it does. It wastes more time and is deliberately designed to make you stay in the store longer and hopefully spend more money.
I get mad because I know that they are using the physical space to manipulate shoppers and break down their decision fatigue.
I also know that these corporations specifically target and look to take the most advantage of women. Specifically low income or dependant ones.
Corporate psychology is a naaaasty place. And they specifically take the most advantage of single women and mothers.
That was actually me job for a year. I was that asshole at Walmart that moved everything. Better than stocking shelves since it was full time M-F. I still hate it 10 years after i left since i can’t locate shit at my Walmart. They moved the pharmacy section all the way across the store.
Some nights my job was to really deep clean the shelves and move maybe a few items to make room for a new product.
The problems came when our sheets tell us how much goes on a shelf and it’seven on the la els but then they just move the tags because they don’t want the cereal to look empty at that section. They also doesn’t like me in the back room because i would bring back loads of overstock because you let an employee stock an 12 boxes of cherios family size on the shelf and I’m following corporate guidelines that say that size should have 2 facings, not 4.
I will say cap 3, mod team, or whatever they call it was still the best job i had at walmart.
We need a standardized grocery store organization system. Like dewey decimal.
I second this notion
I motion to pass
Aye.
Two Ayes here
“GO AROUND”
Hank Green gave a half joking presentation on this topic
This was my favorite Smartypants segment.
What makes you think stores would want that. The reason they reorganize stores to increase profits. They identified certain areas of the store that sell better and move product that they want to increase sales there.
As someone who spent years working retail, it works and is necessary. Gotta sell stuff to stay in business. It’s not always a scam to force you to buy things you wouldn’t.
Doesn’t even need to be moved to a high traffic area. Sometimes just moving it a few feet makes a difference. People get ‘product blind’ when it just sits in the same place forever.
Yeah, but fuck them. That’s why we have laws.
I’m curious. Are there countries with laws preventing that? If so, I’m curious which ones and what the law says? I can’t think of a good law that would prevent stores from doing that.
Well, the original post was proposing that we make that happen somehow. I propose that we use laws. There are lots of laws regulating the interior of a supermarket already, this is one more, although a potentially complex one.
How does this work? Do people not already know what they’re going to buy before going into the store? Does nobody make a list?!?!
I made a list. It’s at home. I should have made a list of things to take to the store so I could put the list on the list.
You never had situation when you saw something new and thought to try it?
If you never do that, then you are in very small minority. I do use shopping list, but still might occasionally get something more than what was on the list.
This is how stores could influence that through strategic product placement.
Generally the only time I do that is if the thing I like is out of stock so I have to look for a replacement. Most of what I eat is cooked at home though, so I’m just buying ingredients.
You know the worst part of it? The reason why is to encourage the “hunter, gatherer” mode in your lizard brain. It’s basically a trick to get you to do impulse purchases.
i don’t get angry because they rearranged the store, i get angry because they ONLY rearranged the store so some worthless, nepo-baby dipshit can justify their existence at the company because they came to the conclusion–after 25 focus groups-- that it’d increase shareholder value by $0.0003 to move the pasta to aisle 3
I figured they just do it regularly so customers have to look at more extra shit they might impulse buy, rather than based on some study of product location adjacency.
Having worked stock in a grocery store, this is part of it. After asking alot of different people at different levels, the consensus is that shelf space is also paid for by many brands, and what space goes to who is decided way above the store level. So once in a while the stockers get paperwork that moves a ton of stuff around, and no one who works in that location has the authority to say no. Sure, sometimes a manager will do that anyway, but they always have a reason, and it’s usually something about the reality of the store configuration, like not putting too many cold items near warm areas, to keep humidity down and reduce spoil.
I think you vastly overestimate the size of grocery store’s budgets
typical shareholder meeting in america:
ceo: i’ve come to a stunning conclusion, and i don’t want to ruffle too many feathers or cause a heart attack–we know what happened to MCfunky last week.
uneasy laughter
ceo: but i have a crazy idea that i’m sure is going to shock everyone in the room, and i’m hesitant to even say this out loud, but, how about we cut one employee per store and raise the prices on ALL items by a nickel!
the room of shareholders went completely silent, until the oldest of the bunch cut a huge fart. what happened next was a raucous laughter that wasn’t heard since the first test screening of ‘a princess bride’ and a round of applause that was usually reserved for a barack obama speech @ $200k a seat (champagne optional).
the forbes editor who was deployed to the meeting immediately came in his pants and a rothschild graciously committed to buying him a new pair, despite the known frugality of the ultra-wealthy (they wouldn’t be rich if they didn’t know how to work a penny). she told him, ‘meet me on rodeo drive next week and i got you covered’ but he missed the appointment because he was supposed to cover alysa liu’s birthday extravaganza.
she was fat anyway, at least that what he told himself. she was kinda fat by european or asian standards but we were in america and the rules of the wild west still apply. who cares how much money she has. alysa dyed her hair green this week. that’s all that really matters,.
You summed up one of the biggest problems in America pretty succinctly.
The soft drinks and sports drinks used to be right next to each other, now they’re 3 aisles apart. What were they thinking?!
sports drinks are a ‘health food’ now their sales are going up
soft drinks are a ‘bad food’ and their sales are going down
so they must be separated
so they must be separated
Marketing
The worst one is the eggs, which could be fucking anywhere (except in countries where they’re in the fridge because they’re bleached or some insane shit).
You mean washed…? They literally are the same but keep longer. That’s the only benefit. They literally just last longer.
They last just fine if you leave them alone - washing removes the protective cuticle. Also, meat shouldn’t need chlorinating.
Downvoted by international big egg
The most accurate description of my pain. Thanks, family-grocery store that I loved.
I just don’t understand why the international foods are a separate aisle. Can those sauces not sit next to the other sauces? Can all types of noodles not co-exist in the same aisle? Why can’t masa flour live next to wheat flour?
The more I think about this, the more it annoys me.
There’s a lot of time and money spent analyzing where to put things to maximize customer spending. It’s why milk and eggs are usually at the back of the store, so that you have to walk through the entire store to get them, and you may find something else to buy on the way there. It’s also why “low-interest” items like international foods get put together in their own low-traffic aisle.
International foods might be “low interest” for many consumers, but for me it’s the most interesting aisle in the supermarket.
Nothing I like more than finding some unusual (to me!) stuff, so I’m happy they put it all in the same place.
As far as price goes, it’s all over. You might find a bottle of Japanese Kewpie mayo for way more than speciality Asian supermarkets ask for, but on the other hand find a huge bag of pistachio nuts for way less money (by volume) than they’re charging for nuts in the ‘regular’ nuts section.
It’s genuinely as if supermarkets know they need to sell this stuff, but haven’t quite worked out what to do with it yet.
That’s also why they rearrange things - not to optimise the layout, but because they hope people will impulse-buy things while looking for the things which have moved
isn’t struggling to deal with change one of the classic autism traits?
Yeah but also its incredibly normal to get mad when the shop changes layouts. They do it on purpose, creating extra work for the workers, extra time and effort for you, because they’ve pushed some bullshit charts around a table and have scientifically deduced that they can squeeze an extra couple of quid out of you.
Actually infuriating.
Is that something that happens regulary in your place? Here in germany, I’ve only seen it after they renovated or replacex old fridges or something
yes, usa grocery stores change their layouts once every other year or so. it’s because they think it will increase sales.
mine literally just changed the layout a month ago. it isn’t everything, usually it’s only about 20-30% of the store that moves.
also sometimes it corresponds to the fact they have changed product lines or vendors or marketing. for example years ago my store had an ‘organics’ aisle, and that went away 3 years ago and they just put the organic options next to the regular items instead do having their own distinct aisle. so if you needed one organic bread and one non-organic, you had to go to two different sections of the store.
also many usa stores massively increased floor space to pre-made in-store foods over the past 5 years. most of my stores at least 1/4 - 1/3 of the store is ready to eat items now, because fewer and fewer people want to cook or prepare their own food. there are fewer groceries now.
they’re just pushing more higher margin products. they’ll restock the ‘basics’ more frequently as a result of giving those things less shelf space.
The aging population and those with disabilities is also part of the demand for ready to eat items in addition to those that just don’t have the time anymore because they work two jobs and want something better than fast food.
In Canada, all the fucking time. I find it infuriating. Never more than a year goes by, often less.
That quick in and out isn’t quick anymore.
In the USA there’s studies and such that track how to maximize money from someone shopping. Milk is a well used staple, so it’s always in the fucking back of the store. So you have to go past most everything else to get to it. Then end caps have special, cheap pick up deals for someone who is just here for milk that they may not pass up. Then the checkout the rule is something like $3 and less for items there. Candy, water, soda, everything a kid craves right there to whine and pester the parents about.
Garron Noone wrote a song about it. Blame the English cunts.
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changing the grocery store aisles is annoying because you can’t shop from habit anymore and you have to figure out the new layout. after you adapt by going a few items you forget about it. it’s annoying to go to aisle 4 for bread and then it’s all chips and you have to figure out where they moved the bread, and it’s on the other side of the store.
it has nothing to do with autism. normies get annoyed when they change it, and i was annoyed as a child when they changed it.
it’s been almost a year here, i’m still going down (what my mind thinks is) the ‘correct’ aisle, only to be reminded when i get there that what i’m looking for i literally walked past a minute earlier, five rows back.
It’s also normal to become less accepting of change as you age. I think this has to do with decreasing neural plasticity and the “crystalized” intelligence (accumulation of information) that comes with age even as “fluid” intelligence (processing speed, etc) declines.
Synaptic strengthening happens as you age - you will lose neuronal density, but the neuronal connections you still have are stronger and more efficient. The myelin sheaths around these neurons thicken well into middle age. The distracting neuronal channels, things that didn’t serve you over your years of experience, have died off leaving only the most effective connections.
So, you’re old, you know how stuff is supposed to be. You work well within that framework. When things change, it’s harder for you to keep up with it. It puts your brain under proportionally more load.
So you get mad when the bread aisle moves.
The effect (aversion to change) is similar to autism, but the cause is basically the exact opposite (autistic folk have higher neuronal density, older folks have less than they used to).
In effect, autistic people don’t like when the bread aisle moves because they have to parse that information through a much more complicated and dense web of neuronal connections, which causes overstimulation and increased cognitive load. Old people have to use old dusty disused neurons, which also causes cognitive strain, and not their nice efficient, highly myelinated neurons.
I kinda miss grocery stores. Where I stay now there isn’t a single store like that, just many small shops. You get used to things maybe being there, maybe not.
