this post was submitted on 27 Jul 2024
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We can’t have anything cool anymore. Every little thing is cost optimized down to the last penny. Self checkout in a soulless white box is the future.
Why wouldn't it. What do you need from a checkout? I want to leave the store, not be entertained, coerced, woo-ed, just leave.
My local Walmart has had so much theft they've blocked off all but 5 self checkout machines, which are manned by 2 associates at all times. Over the years they've gotten rid of all but 8 registers. Now these registers are all open and the lines reach the middle of the store. I hate going there now.
Also everything with a resale value is locked up in cabinets and the one associate with a key can never be found no matter how many times she's paged by other associates.
If Walmart wasn't cheaper by a giant margin I would never shop there again. But all Canadian grocery stores are owned by Billionaire aashats who raise the prices of everything then blame everyone else
i started shoplifting from Walmart after i heard they were closing self checkouts for theft
i figure if they want to make up fake reasons to cut costs, ill do my best to make them not liars
I am vehemently against theft, or at least I used to be. Since they're making me do the work of employees to buy shit, I've started giving myself "employee discounts".
I was in NYC a few weeks ago and needed to buy some face wash, since mine was too big to take on the plane. Usually I just buy some when I get to my destination rather than fucking with the travel bullshit. Welp, literally everything in the entire store was locked, and they wanted $16 for a $6 bottle of face wash, and $8 for a $1 shower floofie. For fucking real.
Ya see, I'm split on it. On one hand, when I was a kid and I saw videos with old-timey american big shops - be it toys, department or something - all big, open, welcoming with everyone smiling and that super fun and nice atmosphere I was sooo sad I couldn't experience that.
On the other hand, self checkout cuts roughly 5-10 minutes of time each time I go to the shop, and as I pretty much speedrun what I need and beeline it to checkout, that means I am spending 10 minutes max at any shop with these. It's so damn convienient I started ignoring shops without it.
But then...I live in european country, and there the only thing preventing theft is a scale inbuilt into self checkout, sometimes coupled with receipt barcode scanner at the exit. Most bigger, and I mean bigger, shops with these have whole one employee per 6-8 of self-checkouts, pretty much there to help in case of approving your age or dealing with more problematic products, like clothing, rarely with something too light for scale to detect.