Well, that’s what I meant in my poll. Leaving = out of earshot, so you potentially miss your number.
It’s not just deli counters. Joann’s fabric cutting has a take a number system. There’s often a lot of people getting fabric cut. Miss your spot in the Q and you;re going to wait a lot.
I wanted to see about buying a gun at Sportsman’s Warehouse. Really all I wanted to do was see if they even had the one I want. I took a number. Half an hour later they were still piddling with the two customers they had, and it sure didn’t look like they were even close to buying anything. I left. For all I know they still haven’t called my number…
And hey, which of you jokers voted that if you get back late, you still get to be served next, even if you missed your number? You don’t get to vote that way without having to post your reasons and accept the derision & abuse!
I disagree. If you want to take the chance, take the chance. Where I go, the deli line is usually at least 10 people deep during normal peak shopping times (evening/weekend). There are always no-shows and skipped numbers. Some people just give up on waiting. Some change their mind. Some have scurried off to another part of the store and missed their number. That’s just part of the system. Northing wrong with it, and nobody is any more inconvenienced than by somebody who just decided their Black Forest ham wasn’t worth waiting for anymore.
Exactly. Plenty of times I’ve finished the rest of my shopping and returned to the deli to see I’m still about 15 places back. I give up & head to the registers at that point.
The Deli at Schnuck’s has a chart showing the thickness with a number assigned to each. I’ll take a picture next trip.
Now that’s an idea. Not everyone likes their meat (or cheese,for that matter) cut to the same thickness.
If you really want to see a confused look on the deli worker’s face, tell them you want it 11/32 of an inch thick.
I wonder how many scalpers began their illicit careers scalping low numbers at the deli…
My local Kroger and Safeway (Colorado Springs) has what I suspect is similar to @Procrustus comment, 15-20 meats, 10-12 different cheeses, and two slicers. But it’s combined with the hot/cold pre-prepped foods (fried and rotisserie chickens, hot sides, cold pre-cooked entrees and sides as well). But they also have the 1lb packages of pre-sliced by the deli of the half dozen most common meats and cheeses.
The problem is that they generally have no more than 2-3 people ever manning the area, and one of them is always checking things in the back, whether it be the cold room inventory, cleaning, checking the fryer, etc. So there’s at best generally one person working the deli area, and one the hot food, so god forbid you want something. And I’m one of the few who will get cold cuts from the case if I need a thinner or thicker slice than the default “wafer-thin” it seems. Between the cost of cold cuts, the moderate at best quality at most chain stores, and the grudging acceptance I seem to get from the staff and people who just want 2 pieces of fried chicken, I just don’t bother more than once or twice a year.
And no, they don’t use tickets and they’re normally far too distracted to pay attention to who was where, when, which has left me biting my tongue when a few people blatantly abused the honor system because they were in a hurry.
BUT - when I go to my favorite deli in Denver, which is very much old-East-Coast style, they make a point of making eye contact with people and use a ticket system during peak times and holidays.
Here’s a slightly different take on the “take a number” scenario. GreatClips has an online check-in service where you put your name in the list on their website before you actually go to the store. Sometimes the estimated wait time is long enough that you can plan to arrive at roughly the expected time your name will be called (they even have a “notify me when I have 10 minutes” or similar feature). Sometimes the wait is shorter and you get there “late.” But when you arrive, there’s a screen with a list of names of people who’ve checked-in, whether online or in-person. In that case, anyone whose name is on the list but isn’t present when they’re called just stays at the top of the list until they show up, and the next person on the list gets served in the meantime. At some point I’m sure they flush people out of the list.
So it’s a little different than the deli counter situation. It would be like if they kept track of which numbers had and hadn’t been served. So if #34 was a no-show, they then called #35, and after they were finished with #35 they called #34 again, and on and on for at least a couple of different cycles. This wouldn’t be as good as the GreatClips example because the customers have no way of seeing how many people are actually ahead of them without a more sophisticated screen.
Sounds a little like the situation Larry encountered in an early episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm, where his doctor has a policy of seeing patients in the order in which they sign in, not the order in which they’re scheduled. (Naturally, Larry just happens to sign in five seconds after a patient who’s scheduled to be seen after him….)
Is their braunschweiger any good?
Eh, it always seems to have hair in it.