we were buying snacks before heading off to a thing and had to ask a clerk to unlock the doors so we could buy $2.88 worth of snacks
insane
Halfway through GDC I had to pick up a box of masks, and ended up having to spend like 15 minutes trying to hunt down a staff member at the Target because they were locked behind glass with a broken buzzer.
Legitimately the biggest culture shock to come from going back to the states. absolute embedded paranoia.
what the hell? what store was this in? i have never seen a Cookie Lock-up in my human lifetime
It's wild the only thing that'll probably break the "item retention" bean counter's grip on stuff like this is the companies themselves
Texas did this one time when I was in HS and the thing that changed it was the snack/drink companies getting mad it directly affected sales ๐
Since 2020 and the "shoplifting" freakout, Target and CVS have started locking stuff up like this and they've still been outliers and it sucks every time I need something from inside.
There was this great article I read the other day about how much this is actually hurting their business, I'll link it later if I find it.
TL;DR they can't hire enough people with poverty wages to keep having them wander around the store to open these things, and they keep losing sales because people don't want to wait around to buy basic stuff behind a glass case, causing it to spiral.
that's all i could think about like all it made me want to do is go "i don't actually need this right now" and fuck off outta there
country incapable of actually solving really basic problems
Can't find the exact article, but here is the statistic from another article on this subject:
"Retailers aren't clueless," said Forbes. "They know customers hate finding stuff locked up. It typically results in a 15% to 25% reduction in sales."
good ol american protestantism will always triumph over basic business sense
Pretty much exactly how I expect this to play out. I will simply go to another store rather than bothering an employee, sooo ๐คทโโ๏ธ
(The local walmarts here have had all their legos in security cases for over a year now, among other thing)
we saw this shit on our New York trip and were baffled by it. we had to ask a clerk to walk over and unlock a case so we could get a fucking bottle of water.
Yeah that shit drives me nuts. Especially when you can tell itโs 100% targeted against โshopliftingโ when a Safeway will do it on shampoo and such but the Whole Foods across the street wonโt do anything like that ๐
Did they swap the snacks and alcohol shelves? I'm glad I have never had the pleasure of seeing this in my neck of the States.
Who would do this
looks up rewards brand name
Oh of course it's CVS lol. CVS and Walgreens are the absolute worst at everything. It's the place you go to pick up meds and get a shot and everything else is just a scam.
These two and Rite Aid always had about a 10-20% markup for "convenience" compared to grocers or supermarkets on top of that.
Not only that but you have to show your receipt on the way out to someone who's wearing body armor and has a gun
canโt tell if this is more or less depressing than all the baby products in the uk now having massive anti-theft tags on
Asking the clerk to please let me into the snack closet, politely thanking them, and then running off with two boxes of oreos without paying and getting away with it because they're under the dollar amount that CVS cares about.
Iconic that the fucking oreos have to be under lock and key and not the chips directly to the side.
at the Wal-Mart across the street from the GSR in Reno, we were trying to buy an $8 hair brush. It took us 3 associates to find one who was willing and able to open the door instead of just walking away, and they had to then put the hair brush in an alarm-locked acrylic case before giving it back to us.
