7 ms·

I've been an Aldi fan for more than a decade, buying almost all of my family's groceries there (four kids, it's cheap and doesn't require figuring out what is r

by mdip 10y ago

I've been an Aldi fan for more than a decade, buying almost all of my family's groceries there (four kids, it's cheap and doesn't require figuring out what is really on sale this week vs. what is really over-priced this week, or messing with Coupons). The quality of most of their products meets or exceeds that of the name brands[1] except in a few circumstances (their equivalents to Cheerios and Frosted Mini Wheats are very sub-par, but in the case of the Cheerios, they're about half the price for a much larger box, so we mix 'em). I actually get a little stressed when I arrive with a cart full of groceries and an empty line -- they ring them up at about twice the speed I can pull them off the cart. The Aldi process is very well thought out. They're the only cashiers I've seen that sit in a chair while ringing things up. They needn't move, nearly at all, beyond swiping things past the register to read those giant barcodes (on anything store branded, which is most things). I remarked to the cashier about their ridiculous speed and was informed they are also tracked, directly, on their speed and have targets to meet (and incentives if they're "the fastest"). [1] Their produce is consistently good (love the sweet, small, green grapes) and their Frozen Chicken Nuggets are better tasting than any I've purchased, including the organic ones at Costco.

shostack 10y ago
The sitting thing is common in England (and perhaps elsewhere in Europe). It definitely stood out to me when I was visiting.
- agentdrtran 10y ago
  It's the standard in Germany as well, at least for grocery stores.
- mdip 10y ago
  It's so rare here I can't think of another time I've seen it. I've always wondered why: comfortable people tend to be less grumpy and the typical cashier job involves "not leaving a very small space for a long period of time". This small space is about the size of ... a chair. I think the perception of people standing in line is more likely to make them feel that the cashier is working slower because they're sitting[1]. Aldi's lightning quick cashiers would prove that wrong, but perception tends to be all that matters in these scenarios. [1] People routinely over-estimate their waiting times in situations like this. This became apparent to me when talking to the helpdesk manager at my old company. He would get an e-mail from time to time from a person complaining that they were on hold for "20 minutes". The call stats for the day indicated a maximum hold time of 5 minutes.
  - wlesieutre 10y ago
    Expect to see more of it in California in the future. All it took was a class action lawsuit (and 7 years). http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-court-sitting-workers-20160404-story.html http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-court-sitting-wo...
  - pbhjpbhj 10y ago
    Standing still for long periods is associated with and/or causes some bad health problems.
    - jgalt212 10y ago
      so is sitting for long periods of time.
- stuaxo 10y ago
  Yup, basically all food stores are sitting, but clothing shops all seem to be standing, weirdly.
  - toyg 10y ago
    The difference is probably the combination of high footfall and continuous restocking in food shops, which results in role specialisation and hence a more static workforce where the role is static.
  - aninhumer 10y ago
    Cashiers in clothing stores are removing hangers and folding things all the time, which is easier if they're standing.
- pouetpouet 10y ago
  standard in France and Germany too. I don't think cashiers usually stand anywhere.
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC 10y ago
What the article doesn't mention: Aldi optimizing the speed of their cashiers is nothing new. The northern Aldi ("Aldi Nord") for a long time had three-digit article codes for every product that cashiers had to know by heart--which also meant that they couldn't have more than 1000 different products. In fact, that system was so efficient that they completely switched to bardcodes only in 2002 as they didn't see any advantage before that.
- mdip 10y ago
  Interesting - Part of me wonders about what their accuracy rate was with that kind of system. 1,000 different 3-digit numbers is still a lot to remember. It's possible, but it would seem to add a pretty big barrier for a lot of people who would otherwise be fine as a cashier, elsewhere. Though when I worked at CompUSA in the early 90s, we lacked barcode readers and each product had a 6-digit SKU which meant only being able to remember a handful of them for the most popular products[0]. It was also horrible for accuracy because each SKU was assigned in order, so fat fingering any of the numbers would result in the wrong product being rung up. This was often caught, but if it was the last or second to last digit that was missed, it was likely to end up being a different version of the same product (more RAM, different CPU, etc) and it would be missed[1] resulting in either the customer paying more (unlikely - those were not missed) or paying less (likely, because the cashier wouldn't notice and the customer was less likely to say anything if they happened to actually notice and the result is them saving a few hundred bucks). [0] We did have one cashier that I'm fairly certain had well over 90% of the products in the store memorized (we'd grab random things trying to throw him off, but he was like a machine). He had brain surgery a decade prior or so and said the way his memory worked changed shortly afterwards. [1] The worst case I recall was a $500-$600 memory upgrade kit for an Compaq laptop that was fat fingered, resulting in the generic being rung up. It had an identical description but was half the price. A few days after inventory was done, they traced it back to a single customer who bought every one we had in stock in one transaction. The customer probably knew the price was way too good and decided to buy them all as a result (it's unlikely even he knew it was a cashier error since the product looked right on the receipt).
  - 10y ago
kevin_thibedeau 10y ago
The funny thing is how POS systems in the US have regressed over the past 25 years. The IBM registers I used in the early 90s were fast and accurate while slinging packages over the scanner. Nowadays everything is laggy and needs special care to present the UPC to the machine just so. That is except for Aldi's systems.
- jboles 10y ago
  This is so true. I worked as a supermarket checkout operator at a large Australian chain of supermarkets for a few years, and the PoS systems were redone while I was there. Before were old Fujitsu machines running an old version of OS/2 with mechanical keyboards. After overhaul, Windows xp embedded machines with touch screens. The touch screens were a massive step backwards, especially when it came to punching in produce codes (many of which I can still remember today). That and the 'express' lanes being physically smaller used a different, smaller model of scanner rather than the larger scanner built into the counter. The smaller scanner, though removable which was helpful when scanning large crates of soft drinks and other heavy items (would pass the scanner to the customer so they didn't have to lift those out of the trolley) was slower and laggier for everything else and had a smaller "field of view"
  - btgeekboy 10y ago
    I've noticed this as well. I worked as a grocery store checker in college, and was consistently one of the most efficient in the store. Yet now when I use self-checkout machines I feel like I'm fighting them every step of the way. Yes, I scanned the item. Yes, I put it in the bag. No seriously, it's in the goddamn bag.
    - jboles 10y ago
      Right with you there. I got into the habit of having both hands going independently scanning items two at a time. The self-checkouts, which only allow one item to be picked up, scanned and placed in the bag at a time, are therefore infuriatingly slow.
    - 10y ago

by mdip 10y ago

shostack 10y ago

The sitting thing is common in England (and perhaps elsewhere in Europe). It definitely stood out to me when I was visiting.

agentdrtran 10y ago
It's the standard in Germany as well, at least for grocery stores.
mdip 10y ago
It's so rare here I can't think of another time I've seen it. I've always wondered why: comfortable people tend to be less grumpy and the typical cashier job involves "not leaving a very small space for a long period of time". This small space is about the size of ... a chair. I think the perception of people standing in line is more likely to make them feel that the cashier is working slower because they're sitting[1]. Aldi's lightning quick cashiers would prove that wrong, but perception tends to be all that matters in these scenarios. [1] People routinely over-estimate their waiting times in situations like this. This became apparent to me when talking to the helpdesk manager at my old company. He would get an e-mail from time to time from a person complaining that they were on hold for "20 minutes". The call stats for the day indicated a maximum hold time of 5 minutes.
- wlesieutre 10y ago
  Expect to see more of it in California in the future. All it took was a class action lawsuit (and 7 years). http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-court-sitting-workers-20160404-story.html http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-court-sitting-wo...
- pbhjpbhj 10y ago
  Standing still for long periods is associated with and/or causes some bad health problems.
  - jgalt212 10y ago
    so is sitting for long periods of time.
stuaxo 10y ago
Yup, basically all food stores are sitting, but clothing shops all seem to be standing, weirdly.
- toyg 10y ago
  The difference is probably the combination of high footfall and continuous restocking in food shops, which results in role specialisation and hence a more static workforce where the role is static.
- aninhumer 10y ago
  Cashiers in clothing stores are removing hangers and folding things all the time, which is easier if they're standing.
pouetpouet 10y ago
standard in France and Germany too. I don't think cashiers usually stand anywhere.

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]

zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC 10y ago

What the article doesn't mention: Aldi optimizing the speed of their cashiers is nothing new. The northern Aldi ("Aldi Nord") for a long time had three-digit article codes for every product that cashiers had to know by heart--which also meant that they couldn't have more than 1000 different products. In fact, that system was so efficient that they completely switched to bardcodes only in 2002 as they didn't see any advantage before that.

mdip 10y ago
Interesting - Part of me wonders about what their accuracy rate was with that kind of system. 1,000 different 3-digit numbers is still a lot to remember. It's possible, but it would seem to add a pretty big barrier for a lot of people who would otherwise be fine as a cashier, elsewhere. Though when I worked at CompUSA in the early 90s, we lacked barcode readers and each product had a 6-digit SKU which meant only being able to remember a handful of them for the most popular products[0]. It was also horrible for accuracy because each SKU was assigned in order, so fat fingering any of the numbers would result in the wrong product being rung up. This was often caught, but if it was the last or second to last digit that was missed, it was likely to end up being a different version of the same product (more RAM, different CPU, etc) and it would be missed[1] resulting in either the customer paying more (unlikely - those were not missed) or paying less (likely, because the cashier wouldn't notice and the customer was less likely to say anything if they happened to actually notice and the result is them saving a few hundred bucks). [0] We did have one cashier that I'm fairly certain had well over 90% of the products in the store memorized (we'd grab random things trying to throw him off, but he was like a machine). He had brain surgery a decade prior or so and said the way his memory worked changed shortly afterwards. [1] The worst case I recall was a $500-$600 memory upgrade kit for an Compaq laptop that was fat fingered, resulting in the generic being rung up. It had an identical description but was half the price. A few days after inventory was done, they traced it back to a single customer who bought every one we had in stock in one transaction. The customer probably knew the price was way too good and decided to buy them all as a result (it's unlikely even he knew it was a cashier error since the product looked right on the receipt).
- 10y ago

kevin_thibedeau 10y ago

The funny thing is how POS systems in the US have regressed over the past 25 years. The IBM registers I used in the early 90s were fast and accurate while slinging packages over the scanner. Nowadays everything is laggy and needs special care to present the UPC to the machine just so. That is except for Aldi's systems.

jboles 10y ago
This is so true. I worked as a supermarket checkout operator at a large Australian chain of supermarkets for a few years, and the PoS systems were redone while I was there. Before were old Fujitsu machines running an old version of OS/2 with mechanical keyboards. After overhaul, Windows xp embedded machines with touch screens. The touch screens were a massive step backwards, especially when it came to punching in produce codes (many of which I can still remember today). That and the 'express' lanes being physically smaller used a different, smaller model of scanner rather than the larger scanner built into the counter. The smaller scanner, though removable which was helpful when scanning large crates of soft drinks and other heavy items (would pass the scanner to the customer so they didn't have to lift those out of the trolley) was slower and laggier for everything else and had a smaller "field of view"
- btgeekboy 10y ago
  I've noticed this as well. I worked as a grocery store checker in college, and was consistently one of the most efficient in the store. Yet now when I use self-checkout machines I feel like I'm fighting them every step of the way. Yes, I scanned the item. Yes, I put it in the bag. No seriously, it's in the goddamn bag.
  - jboles 10y ago
    Right with you there. I got into the habit of having both hands going independently scanning items two at a time. The self-checkouts, which only allow one item to be picked up, scanned and placed in the bag at a time, are therefore infuriatingly slow.
  - 10y ago