A Simple Hatred of Self Check Out
When I was growing up there were a few things that were for certain when you went into a grocery store. First there was going to be plenty of open check out lines, second that a very cute teenage boy would bag your groceries and then carry them out to the car for you. Then I became a very broke college student that didn’t step foot in a grocery store for a few years. Finally the day came when my diet consisted of more than ramen noodles, cafeteria food, and my roomates stale waffles and I headed back into the grocery store to find that no one took your bags to your car anymore. This was fine with me since I was young and I was never sure of the issue of tipping them for their help.
Fast forward a few more years and a new thing came into play at the grocery store; the self check out line. At first it was met with a breath of relief. No longer would I have to stand behind an elderly person who smelled of moth balls and had to alphabetize their groceries as they placed them on the conveyor belt when I was only buying one pack of gum and a can of soda.
Oh how the romance has faded since I first layed eyes on the self check out lines. First of all they never work right and you spend most of your time calling the attendant, who seems to never be attending, to come help. Secondly grocery stores are becoming more and more dependent on these self check outs rather than using actual cashiers.
The second point is what truly boggles me. The first time I ever ran into a major problem with the groceries store’s dependence on self check out lines was at a neighborhood Kroger store only a few months after they were installed. It was about 10 o’clock at night and I had a sleeping baby with me that I was wearing in a sling. As usual I grocery shopped for two weeks worth of food and dry goods including a huge bag of dog food. When I went to the front to pay the only things that were open were the self check out lines. My cart was overflowing and I did not want to check it all out myself so I asked if they could open a lane. They said no. I asked for the manager. After a long wait the manager came down and said that in the late evening from now on the store would only be using self check out. Remember that I had a sleeping baby in a sling which I didn’t want to wake by taking things out of my cart, ringing them up myself, bagging them myself and then placing them back in the cart all by myself. This was a new policy that I had no idea about so I told the manager that he could put up all the items in my basket and went to leave. I guess they thought it would be easier to ring me up in a regular line than to put everything back that was in my basket so they told me they would make an exception this one time. Their corporate office later told me that they would always be willing to open a lane up at night for me. It didn’t matter because I changed stores to the local HEB store which didn’t have self check out lanes. If you don’t value the customer, you are missing out on business 101.
This spring we moved to a new area of Houston and part of the fun of moving is exploring new grocery stores. There’s a Randalls grocery store that is very easy for me to get to and I like their layout. It’s a nice store. For those of you that aren’t familiar with Randalls, they consider themselves to be a high end grocery store. Everything there is a little bit more expensive and the store always looks amazing. In fact on Randall’s own website they boast about providing the best of everything, including customer service. But once again I found a store that is in love with it’s dependence on self check out and not really caring about the customers.
Twice now I have gone in the middle of the day and they have one regular lane open and four self check out lanes open. The first time I stood in a line behind three other people for the regular. Now one was in the self check out line except the attendant. I asked the guy checking me out how he felt and he said that he hated it because it puts more work on him. I gave him my business card and asked him to have his manager contact me. I never heard from anyone.
The second time I once again went in the middle of the day with three tired children. After a long shopping trip with a very full cart I once again only found one regular lane open with four empty self check out lanes. This time I stood behind four other people with their full carts and waited for a long time while three more people pilled up behind me. The self check out attendant walked to the end of the aisle and told the woman in front of me to bring her cart over there. The woman said no. Then the attendant looked at me and told me to bring my cart there. I shook my head no. I want real customer service, especially when I already have my hands full with three kids. She replied in a very rude tone, “I’ll do it for you”. No. I stood my ground.
I refuse to continue to let groceries store raise their prices and cut their labor for their own profit. My bill for that one trip to Randalls was over $200 while minimum wage is a little over $7. Surely there was enough profit in my one transaction to have another checker on the floor. And that was just my one transaction, imagine how much profit that the other 6 people waiting in line with me could have brought in during the 15 minutes I was waiting in line.
First it was the baggers carrying the bags out to your car for you and now the groceries stores want you to check yourself out while stuffing the profitable proceeds in their pockets. Step by step the customer service of the grocery store is changing for the worse. The prices will continue to rise and the workers within the store will continue to disappear in the interest of profit.
Some people may argue that this is just something that has to happen to keep grocery store prices in check. That is simply not true. The grocery store chain HEB does not use self check out lanes, there’s a bagger for every lane and their prices are lower than the other two large grocery store chains in Houston. If Randalls has to cut out grocery store checkers in order to survive, how can HEB make it with an army of checkers and baggers always at the ready?
It’s not a question of economics, it’s purely a question of putting the dollar before the person.
Lisa W. says
I agree completely! I don ‘t like self-checkouts because I always have a problem with something and have to wait for the attendant who is either not there or is helping another self-checkout person. I go through the self-checkout if I have 5 items or less but anything more than that I just wait in line at the regular checkout. Although, sometimes I hate the regular checkout, as well…nothing is worse than dealing with a cranky child AND a cranky cashier….stores need to step up customer service and teach employees not to bring their bad attitude to work!
Bobbie says
My husband was at that same Randalls last night and he wanted to dispute the price on something and there was no attendant. He said he waited several minutes for someone to come help him and then when they did show up the lady didn’t believe him that the price was marked different and wanted him to take her to see it. I’ve never heard of that. Usually they send a bagger or call someone to check the price, I’ve never been told that I need to take them to see the price. He told her never mind and just paid for his other items.
Sheila says
Is Walmart an option? They always have checkers. I personally love self check, but only when I have a few items. For my weekly trips, Walmart always has several checkers available. I’m not in your state (but love HEB when we visit Texas!), but I’ve had good experiences at Walmart (gasp! 🙂 ) in the three states I’ve lived in recently.
Bobbie says
There is Walmart neighborhood market (food only) in my town but I’ve never been in it. That’s a great thought. I always forget about it because it’s set way back from the road. There is an HEB here that I love, it’s just a little further but it’s worth the extra drive.
Kristi says
I couldn’t agree more! Self check-out lanes are ridiculous and the lack of customer service is even more ridiculous. In all honesty, I wish that grocery stores would realize that while times have changed, that doesn’t mean that the consumer doesn’t want that interaction with the cashier. Top that with shopping with kids….oh my!!! What mom really wants to tackle wrangling their kids to stand by their cart while she checks out her families own groceries. Give us some check out lanes with real people please! 🙂 As for H-E-B, they are AWESOME and always make sure that the customer is number 1! They have not lost sight of what customer service is and that’s why I love my H-E-B!!! 🙂
Bobbie says
I love HEB too. Ours here in our little town is really small (still awesome) but I sometimes try out other stores for more selection rather than driving across the bridge to a bigger HEB. But then that happens to me every single time that I don’t go to HEB. Yes. I want human interaction when I am paying as much as I am! Put self check outs in the dollar store! that’d be great. But a basket so full that I should of really used two carts is not possible with self check out.
Cynthia says
I would like to say self check-out is fine if you only have a few items- but there are always glitches in ringing things in or whether it thinks you put it on the belt or didn’t put it on the belt. So annoying. Save someone’s job and don’t use self-checkout.
Bobbie says
That is a great way to put it. Save someone’s job. And if your store is primarily using self check out, call the store and speak to a manager. I’m calling Krogers tomorrow since it happened to me again tonight at the local Krogers.
Rachel says
There has been plenty of times that I’ve gone to Walmart or Safeway for groceries and they either refuse to open more check out stands or the people that are checking you out are extremely rude. Regardless of how miserable you think your job at Walmart is, it’s not an excuse for you to be rude to your customers. If I could shop somewhere else in my tiny town I would. I hate the way they treat people there.
Bobbie says
That’s horrible. I wish you had an HEB, they give great service every single time.
Emilee says
Hi, I just recently discovered your blog through pinterest. I’ve been reading some of your stuff and I came across this post, I thought you might like to hear about a similar issue through the eyes of a cashier.
Firstly, that good grocery store you want with the amazing customer service and zero self check out lanes used to exist in Michigan in the Lansing area. I worked at it for almost four years. I got my first job there as a service clerk when I was sixteen and quit a little bit before I turned 19. As a service clerk, I took every customers groceries out to their car for free and I refused all tips. Inside the store, we were all a really happy bunch of cashiers. Service was top notch because if anyone had shown any thoughtlessness with any customer they got slammed. At first this was never an issue, we were always very happy to help customers.
About the time I left, this store had gone for the worst. They never did open self check outs so that was a plus, but they started treating a lot of the employees like garbage ever since it came into new management. The last few months I had worked there I was openly discriminated against for my physical handicap by a few of my managers and I was picked on despite all my years of hard work. The managers then began to change the store. When at first the focus was on customer service, they started to panic because of the threat of competition from big names like Meijer, Kroger and Wal-Mart (all three of which were less than a mile away). In this panic, these managers forgot what the store was there for and began jacking up the prices worse than they previously were (and trust me they were really high). Along with that, they tried to implement these “customer appreciation cards” that were supposed to help save money on gas through BP of all gas stations. And these came out around the time of the BP oil spill to boot. They slashed employee hours more and more until they eliminated all baggers which meant people had to take their own groceries out again. When through all of this entire panic, if that store had remembered why it had stayed in business in the first place for almost 75 years, they would never have lost footing and gone out of business.
I’m sorry I typed up this novel for you, but it does have a point. What i’m trying to say is a majority of reason why these mom and pop stores go out of business or mess up customer service and act blatantly rude, is due to bad management. I understand some cashiers can truly be rude employees, but most of them are not. Most of the time they are required to do something by their managers that, if not complied with, they could lose their jobs or get in serious trouble. Even if it means something as harmless as opening up a lane and checking out a family really quick, there are supervisors who will seriously nail you for that. And as long as the economy is going the way it is and these business owners continue to make money despite the carelessness for their customers, this will not change and not improve. A lot of owners want to live like kings off of your paycheck by slashing customer service and valuing disrespect over good business ethics. I say this honestly and truthfully because I am a business major and I see firsthand how a lot of these businesses are run. The best thing we can do is familiarize ourselves with the said business as much as possible and support the ones who are doing it right.
-Em
Bobbie says
I love your comment. It really made me rethink the situation and I bet that employee at self check out was rude only because she was told to get people over there. It was probably just stress on her by the management. Thanks so much for sharing your story.
Chris says
Not to play devil’s advocate, but I believe there is room for another side to this story. First of all, please don’t hear me endorsing any sort of poor customer service. There is simply no excuse for any customer to be treated like anything less than an invaluable part of the store system. After all, without the customer, there is literally NO reason to do any of this.
That being said, the grocery store itself is deceptively unprofitable. Did you know that the average profit margin for a Kroger Store in the first two quarters of 2012 was 1.51%? That means, if everything goes exactly to plan, for every 100 dollars the grocery store spends on payroll, utilities, rent, and stock, they expect about $101.51. Though this margin is not flat (there are some items in the store that have a significantly higher margin, some with a NEGATIVE margin), it is safe to say that a grocery store is in a perilous position. Ever wonder why things cost more at smaller stores? Usually, its because they don’t have the bulk buying power of a major chain, so their stocking costs are higher.
Why is all of this so important? Because grocery stores are important! A clean, safe, dependable place for people to buy healthy, sustaining food is an integral part of any community. If even one of the grocery stores in my medium sized Michigan town closed, people would not only be saddened, they would be up in arms.
Of course, a grocery store is a business, and businesses are driven by profit. This communal element makes it easy to forget that the owners and operators of these establishments are working to not just feed your family, but to put food on their own tables as well, and that requires making sound business decisions like cutting costs by using new technology, reducing labor allotments, and shortening the available list of options for customers.
I have worked in retail management (as well as grocery) for many years before changing careers, and I can tell you that just like any other business, there are good eggs and bad eggs (no pun intended). There will always be stores who just don’t ‘get it’ when it comes to customer service. However, it is unfair to paint grocers as sitting in the back room, smoking a cigar, and, as you said, “stuffing the profitable proceeds in their pockets”. Assuming that Randall’s profit margin is, say THREE TIMES that of Kroger (as you mentioned, they are a ‘higher end’ store), that 200 dollar grocery bill just netted the store a hefty $9.06.
We are all under pressure, hard to remember sometimes. Hope this perspective is considered!
Bobbie says
I appreciate your extremely well thought out and written comment. I am going to reply to it, just give me a few days because this weekend is crazy! I do have a reply brewing in this head of mine.