A drugstore I used to work at re-set their floor plan after I left. Shelves which once ran across the store were now placed so that they ran back to front. Since I had once worked there, the original floor plan was so burned into my brain that I could not cope with the change. I stopped there one time, saw that I would never find anything I wanted there again, and left. That store is closed now. Guess they just couldn’t go on without me. 
During my tenure at Former Employer (a major regional supermarket chain that was ultimately bought out by Huge European Conglomerate), switching around floor plans was par for the course. At least the store manager made sure everyone got a copy of what was currently in each aisle. The down side? The copy would change daily, depending on what was moved. At least the departments were in their same location, so it wasn’t that bad.
In the supermarket biz, the floor plans are automatically switched around if the chain has been bought by another company. Part of it is “traffic studies” as Lissa (I think) mentioned earlier. The bigger reason is that the New Company wants to make its mark – they want you, the customer, to realize that it’s no longer The Store You’ve Come To Love For The Past X Years. Ergo, the layout changes and the complaints begin.
You don’t really have a fucking clue what a monopoly is, do you? Or a capitalist.
If there was any toilet paper at all. Sorry comrade, no TP this week; but we have 80,000 pairs really shitty shoes. Size 12AA only.
I debated about whether to use the “C” word because I really didn’t want to go off on a political debate. I should have listened to my inner reservations.
Suffice it to say that I meant the phrase in approximately the same way as teenager yells at his father, “I hate you!”
I’m a small business person, I live under a capitalist system and have no desire to live in a socialist economy. I was not proposing that as a better model.
What I despise about capitalists, marketers, and people in general, is hypocrisy. Apologists for capitalism, including most Libertarians I have spoken with, insist that the customers’ every whim will be served by merchants who will be spurred by the demands of competition to offer the best prices and customer service. This post provides just one rather tame example of how this dream of a capitalist utopia is no more true than the idealistic goals of socialism. Human nature (e.g., greed and deceit) always triumphs.
Now can we get back to kvetching about those damn stores?
Not so, at least with me. For instance, I despise the maze-like floor plans in Rite-Aid drug stores (very well-described here), that are intentionally designed to force you to walk around and through the store in a haphazard way so you’ll have to see more crap. And although there is one very conveniently located near my bank, I flat out refuse to ever set foot in it. Or any Rite-Aid, for that matter. And given the link I posted, I’m not the only one who has stopped shopping there, nor the only one who hopes they go out of business for maliciously manipulating customers into irritable frustration.
My regular grocery store just did a big overhaul of the aisles to highlight the fact that they have a lot of new “healthier” and organic versions of various stuff. I actually think it does look better, and since the spots I mostly shop from (produce, meat, and dairy) don’t move it doesn’t affect me much. This isn’t a huge big box store though, it’s pretty small as grocery stores go.
I guess you can… stores rearranging things just don’t bother me.
Two years ago Christmas I ventured with great trepidation to Toys-backward letter-Us. It was a well designed labrynth. I think you had to get through each isle twice before finding the magic portal to the cash registers.
The horror of the floor to ceiling hot pink Barbie isle still haunts me. The goggles, they do nothing!
Toys Backwards R Us is pure undiluted evil.
That’s all I wanted to say.
I’ve got two of these:
#1 - Costco in Chicago western burbs. Not only did they always rearrange things, but none of the aisles were ever marked. I know in a warehouse store product changes frequently, but Sam’s will at least label the aisle.
#2 - Dick’s sporting goods (formally Gaylans). Local store basically moved everything in the north half of the store to the south half, and of course, everything in the south half to the north half. Guys, at least mix it up a little.
I guess maybe you should have, you sanctimonious twat. But don’t blame me that you didn’t.
This is a well-put rejoinder to those who hysterically accuse you of wanting to live under Papa Joe. Sheesh!
A little common sense would allow anyone to realize most retail stores have to rearrange their shelves on a regular basis.
Not many people buying pencils, notebooks, backpacks. lunchboxes in July, huh? But it’s August and school has started, or is starting next week. Really think that half-aisle of school supplies is going to suffice? Of course not. They need two aisles now, maybe three. How can they do this without rearranging?
And how many stores would want their grills, flip-flops and pool toys taking up all the front of the store space in February?
C’mon.
What chaps my ass is how the items that I most want to just grab and go with are always at the very back of the store. I realize it’s deliberate, but sometimes all I really want to do is pick up milk and get back home quickly without having to walk 27,000 miles to get it! For the last couple years I haven’t even gone to some stores where prices are much cheaper just because I so resent being forced to walk so far for basic items (and also because I was having some serious foot pain and it was not fun to end up in severe pain from what should have been a 2-minute shopping trip). I’ll pay more money for convenience and courtesy to the customer. Yeah, I know I’m weird, but saving 50¢ just isn’t worth the time and aggravation most of the time.
I don’t think people are bothered much by seasonal spaces or moving things to make room for new products. But it definitely irritating when you have to wandr all over a store to find what you want.
I don’t mind the necessary seasonal shuffles; but switching newspaper and magazine racks around for no apparent reason and not informing the vendors,aswell?
And it’s not just magazines, I briefly worked in the sales dept. of a bakery and found bread aisles moved from one end to the other with nobody bothering to tell the bread vendors, let alone the customer.
I heard the same compaints from the chip stockers, cracker and cookie stockers, cereal stockers, pop stockers, etc.
At least the dairy guys couldn’t be easily shuffled as those big refrigerators are pretty much fixed in place.
And this brings us as to why you can’t grab milk or eggs at the front of the store.
Most stores have their utilities entering back at the loading area. It saves on wiring, refrigerant and refrigerant tubing, etc. to put dairy in the back. I’d love to see someone put in a back entrance complete with a couple of checkstands for when I just need dairy items, eggs or something from the freezer.
I can’t remember a major re-arrangement of a store’s layout having happened in the last five or six years. Before then they moved sections around. When I asked I was told the changes were to better organize products. It wasn’t really any better but not particularily worse either. What annoyed me was the non-sensical reclassification of certain items. Salsa always went in the hispanic foods section, but now goes with salad dressing. Why? Have people suddenly started putting salsa on their salads? Should we really encourage such whack-a-doodle behavior?
Besides being clean, uncluttered and well-stocked, Target keeps their seasonal stuff all in one section (near the back of course), so there’s minimal moving around. Which is one reason their staff can help me find things on the rare ocassion I can’t do it myself. There was never a better day than when I stopped going to WalMart and RiteAid.
I think Wal-marts are special portals to hell–never enter one, if I can help it. Last one I was in was in Nebraska in 1998.
Not familiar with Rite Aide, and am glad!
Target really doesn’t move stuff around much, I’ve noticed, nor does Kohl’s.
Just the grocery and the drug store (Osco).
I don’t have any trouble at all with the current Rite-Aid swoopy layout. There’s a main corridor that takes me straight to the back to the pharmacy, or I can just walk up the side of the store if I want to take the quick route. And by cruising the center aisle, I can look down the shorter aisles on either side to see what’s there, which considering how small many drugstore items are is more helpful than big long aisles. Plus each aisle at the Rite-Aids I’ve been to are well labeled so I find what I want quite easily.
I’ve been going to one Rite-Aid for the last four years and they never once in all that time moved anything in the store around except the two small seasonal aisles up at the front. And they were clean, well stocked, had friendly and helpful staff. What’s not to like?
I’m finding this thread rather bizarre. While I’m very sympathetic to the complaints, I can’t think of any stores around here that have ever rearranged shit just for the sake of rearranging. The grocery store was constantly rearranged last summer, but they were doing major renovations that kinda rippled across the store, so it wasn’t exactly optional. Hell, not only has Canadian Tire not rearranged their store here ever, but it’s got exactly the same layout as every other Canadian Tire built within the past couple decades (well, some are mirror images, but that’s a minor point).