Thanks for the fun thread. From your detailed post, I think I know the name of the store you work at. And there’s one between my office at Purdue (WL) and home. But do I shop there? Not often…various beefs, all could be generalilzed as issues I have with retail in general, but particularly bad at this store:
So many self-checkout kiosks, so few cashiers. I prefer to have a real person ring my stuff up. That, or accept a $5 discount for doing the work myself. Any takers? No? Thought not. (I firmly believe self-serve kiosks should be avoided if you have more than 2 or 3 items. Principles…)
The dumb survey questions at the end of the transaction? I usually answer them, but did not realize they were mandatory now. Geez! Maybe I’ll use these guys even less than before.
The location of common products was frequently baffling, to the extent that I usually visited the local Kroger-owned store (different name) because at least I could figure out where everything is…that despite the fact that this Kroger store has been under construction for the last two years. For example, when I first moved here, I pretty much gave up on finding olive oil (so common for cooking) at your store. The best I could find was some sort of weird olive oil blend. Later, spouse and I figured out that olive oil was in a different aisle, away from the other oils. Why?
I’ve all but given up on large DIY stores such as Lowe’s and Home Dopey. If you don’t know exactly where something is located in those stores, there is a very small likelihood that any employee there knows, either. At Ace, every employee in the store, with the possible exception of the cashiers, knows were everything is located and how it’s used. Granted, they’re smaller stores, but they train their employees.
The last time I was in a HD, it went something like this (once I was able to corner an employee):
Me: (standing in aisle 8) Can you tell me where I can find XXX?
He: (Looking around aimlessly) Ummm. . .I think that’s in aisle 43.
(tromptromptromp to aisle 43)
He: Nope, I don’t see it. Hey, Bob, do you know where we stock XXX?
Bob: (looking around aimlessly) Ummm. . .I think that’s in aisle 3, Stan.
(tromptromptromp to aisle 3)
He: Well, I don’t see it here, either. Hey, Rich, do know where we stock XXX?
Rich: Ummm. . .lessee. . .I think that’s in aisle 54.
Me: Y’know what? I can wander around aimlessly all by myself, trying to guess where things are. Is there anyone who actually knows where this might be?
He: Ummm. . . . . . . . . .
I left without it. That’s been at least ten years ago and I’ll never return.
I wanted to buy a wall clock, so I went to Target (which had a cheap one for three bucks) but could not find it. So I went home, went to the website and bought it for in-store pickup. Went back after a hour and it was right there at the customer service desk.
At this point, given how common smartphones are, it should be possible to use an app to be guided to the thing you’re looking for.
You’re assuming that the stocker put it in the correct place on the shelf with that. If they didn’t, with the on-line shop/in-store pickup it will be store employee wandering around looking for the fool thing instead of you.
I have had this experience about half the time. The other half I am lucky to find a person who understands exactly what I want and knows where it is.
Yesterday I went to the HD web site, entered my store, looked up two items I wanted, and each page showed the aisle and bin number where the items are stocked. There is an option to text it to your phone. I went to the store, looked at my phone, went directly to the locations. In and out in about 3 minutes.
Most of the staff still don’t know anything outside their one aisle of expertise but it’s a better experience than it was 10 years ago.
Maybe… maybe not. I am not naming or acknowledging the name of my employer in this thread because it’s exactly the sort of discussion that can get me in trouble with HR if it’s too obvious who I’m talking about.
Oh, I agree - the self-serve really isn’t for full size orders, just the smaller ones. And ones that don’t require human assistance to process. Yet we see people pull up with three large carts full of stuff and try to run it through self-serve. Ye, gads. :rolleyes:
Anyhow - we our latest remodel they pulled six or eight of the self-serve lanes out because people such as yourself wanted more human-run lanes. They are scheduling more human cashiers, but that doesn’t mean there are really enough of us on the floor any given day/time.
If you don’t answer the question the cashier will do it for you after you walk off. Which is the only way we can get this stupidity to “work”.
Huh. Unless it’s a super-special important with, say, the other Greek or Italian foods it’s either with the other oils in baking or with the salad dressing. So… that would be olive oil in at least two of the three possible locations. In my store. You may just have a bad local store.
It’s not bad for you. It just means that if you came to the store in person and were relying on an app to show you where an item is located it may not work as you had hoped. If you’re doing a pick-up then no, it doesn’t matter to you.
Last weekend, I had to pick up an item at Home Depot. I googled it first to see how the Home Depot price compared to the Amazon price. It gave me the option to pick it up in my local store, and told me the exact aisle where it was located!
Then I needed to get something from Walmart, and was able to do the same thing…but I had to download the stupid Walmart app to get that info.
So there’s that. I generally agree with you, though. I much prefer smaller stores like Ace. However, being smaller, they don’t have nearly the same selection as that of the larger stores.
ETA: I guess I should finish reading the thread before posting – I see that others have posted much the same info.
Re: Home Depot employees. Since they rarely have any idea what the item I am asking for is, the suggestion they would actually know where it is is preposterous.
E.g., Teflon plumbing tape in the plumbing department. “Where is it?” Blank look. “Never mind, I’ll find it myself.”
I have no problem with self-service checkout IF they would work half as good as what the cashiers have at their disposal.
They are especially annoying (& slow) for when you may be buying multiples of an item on sale. “You bought ___, price $1.99, discount 10¢” It needs to verbalize all of that to me before I can scan another one. I could scan almost as fast as the professionals IF the system would let me & if you try & go just a little too fast for it you get, “Unexpected item in bagging area, please wait for an attendant.” It also seems I get that message half the time that I either place my own bag there or remove my full bag. It’s not saving me any time if the one attendant needs to come over multiple times. When the cashier rings up my order it doesn’t read out the price & the discount, why should it for self checkout?
While you’re fixing that bug, don’t wait until the very end to give me my discount on items like another store does. Their system calculates full, retail price until after you press <Finish & Pay>.
Ummm, I don’t have $300 on me. Oh wait, now that the ‘lottery has finished playing’ & reducing each price individually, the total is now down to about $16.23. :smack:
This reminds me of when I sent my wife to Lowe’s to get some 1/2" hardware cloth.
Long story short, at least 2 of the 'droids had no idea of what hardware cloth was (this was, of course, a hardware store) and tried to tell her they didn’t carry it. She wouldn’t take no for an answer and got a third one to find it.
Hardware cloth, at a hardware store. Who’da thunk?
That’s a completely non-intuitive name. I’ve never heard of it, and it’s impossible to guess what it means if you don’t know. I’m not sure what “she wouldn’t take no for an answer” means, but simply explaining that it means a type of wire mesh might be helpful.
I tend to agree. I’ve never heard of “hardware cloth” before, either. I would refer to this as wire mesh.
On the other hand, Lowes (and Home Depot) both call it hardware cloth on their websites, so it seems like their employees should be able to figure this out.
I have been bitching about employers on the internet since 1995 and have escaped being fired for it largely by being very careful and paranoid. See no reason to change that now.
I have heard of it and I have bought it, and someone who works in a hardware store should know what it is. If not, then the store has utterly failed to train their employees in the basics. They don’t have to be an expert on how to use everything but they should know what it is.
Stores don’t want it for same reason they keep moving aisles around, they want you to wander through the store and make impulse buys. It may seem random, but there’s market research and planning for where things are and where to place them. Walk in to a chain store like 7-11 and despite what you would expect, each store is laid out slightly differently based on demographics.
Sometimes if you go to a store late at night or early in the morning, you’ll see the manager with a map of where everything goes.
