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I don't find it hard to believe that a few stores ran out of bananas or whatever for a day. That's all it would take for a customer to snap a picture. The pictu

I don't find it hard to believe that a few stores ran out of bananas or whatever for a day. That's all it would take for a customer to snap a picture. The picture of a meat department cooler with empty slide racks was obviously in the middle of a reset - notice the lack of price tags on all the racks because they were just installed.

gamblor956 9y ago
The problem isn't that a few stores ran out of bananas or one item for the day. Take a look at the pictures: entire sections like produce are basically empty. The only time I've seen shelves that bare were at Kmart and Sears locations before they went bankrupt and shut down.
- tinfins 9y ago
  I took another look at the pictures. Notice all those stores where whole sections are out are in the Northeast. Probably they missed a delivery or two because of the weather. Plus during extreme weather grocery stores get shopped hard. There was one picture of an empty banana set with a pineapple in the wrong spot - that's what I was referring to before. The sole picture in San Francisco was the reset I mentioned.
  - onli 9y ago
    But that's exactly the problem the article describes: That the moment something goes wrong the stores don't have any reserves anymore, because the system is too strictly set on reducing costs and spoilage, seemingly with a total disregard to consumer satisfaction and overall profit. Add to that crazy-sounding control schemes - which maybe is kinda normal in a country like the US without real employee protection laws, but is unthinkable in less free market capitalist societies. Not sure why you defend your employer here. If the problem is real - which I'm in no position to judge - it would be in his best interest to notice it.
    - bearcobra 9y ago
      Anecdotally, I have experienced the same phenomenon at several major grocery chains in Canada. City gets hit with a winter storm and Safeway, SuperStore, & Walmart all had empty produce & bread sections. I've also seen it in certain stores during summer months in the run up to a long weekend. Not saying the new supply chain software can't be the cause, but there does seem to be other reasonable explanations.
      - onli 9y ago
        During a canadian winter storm to have more than usual empty shelves is of course very reasonable ;) And I'm also used to having less products available in some supermarkets when nearing night time. The images shown in the article though seem ridiculous to me. But I agree, absolutely possible that there are other explanations (including that there is no problem at all), but a wrongly prioritized supply chain scheme/software fits very well to the shown and described issues.
      - kolbe 9y ago
        If those are the companies we should compare Whole Foods to, then I will stop going to Whole Foods and save 50%
      - biiirdtime 9y ago
        Are you from the Fraser Valley by any chance?
    - tinfins 9y ago
      So you think stores should just keep a huge backstock of fresh produce just in case an extreme weather event or some other rare issue hits? That's going to lead to less fresh produce for the 350 days a year when everything goes smoothly. The OTS system in the article also allows for exceptions - if there were bananas available the store could have stocked up on them. It's just so wrong on many levels - I could spend all day pointing them out, but this thread is getting bigger than I thought and I don't know if I can spend much more time on it. I was going to edit my original comment with more information but it doesn't look like I can anymore.
  - gamblor956 9y ago
    The header image where the veggie section is basically empty is actually from Houston, so I'm going to assume that you're being willfully blind about the issues raised in the article. It's not a regional issue, it's systemic.
    - deleted 9y ago
      [deleted]
  - dgacmu 9y ago
    The article came out a day or so after I went to the Whole Foods in Pittsburgh, and for the first time, when the cashier asked if I'd found everything, I said quite strongly: "No!". There were really surprising gaps in availability -- there was no soy milk (fresh or shelf-stable), no rice milk, no stock of several types of yogurt, surprisingly slim pickings in several of the veggie sections, no vegetable stock, only the most expensive types of diced tomatoes left (no 365 brand), and a few other things. The cashier said it was probably because the delivery truck didn't make it the previous day because of snow, but was surprised because the truck had made it earlier that day. IANA whole foods employee, but this certainly jibes with reduced stocking levels increasing fragility under delivery misses. I've never seen my WFM that empty before.
- rdiddly 9y ago
  Well, it's the result of a decision made by a company that was, at the time, having some difficulty competing, and was desperately trying to cut prices, and then soon thereafter, sold itself to Amazon. So the resemblance is not altogether coincidental.
dingaling 9y ago
Why are they resetting a section during shopping hours? Even 30 years ago when I was a student worker in a food store that sort of task only happened after 22:00 when the last customers had left.
- briandear 9y ago
  Not particularly relevant to the article, but a fun fact is that in France -- there's no such thing as after hours reseting in grocery stores. When the store closes -- everyone goes home.
- ethbro 9y ago
  If store sales > shelf capacity, you have to intraday restock.
- tinfins 9y ago
  Most meat teams at WFM don't have overnight crews. The thing is too, it's a snapshot. We don't know how long it looked like that, what time of the day it was, whether someone called out sick, etc.
- donarb 9y ago
  A lot of grocery stores have non-employees stocking shelves now, usually during the day. These are reps from the vendors, like potato chips or specialty foods that rent shelf space in the store are and responsible for maintaining them.

gamblor956 9y ago

The problem isn't that a few stores ran out of bananas or one item for the day. Take a look at the pictures: entire sections like produce are basically empty. The only time I've seen shelves that bare were at Kmart and Sears locations before they went bankrupt and shut down.

tinfins 9y ago
I took another look at the pictures. Notice all those stores where whole sections are out are in the Northeast. Probably they missed a delivery or two because of the weather. Plus during extreme weather grocery stores get shopped hard. There was one picture of an empty banana set with a pineapple in the wrong spot - that's what I was referring to before. The sole picture in San Francisco was the reset I mentioned.
- onli 9y ago
  But that's exactly the problem the article describes: That the moment something goes wrong the stores don't have any reserves anymore, because the system is too strictly set on reducing costs and spoilage, seemingly with a total disregard to consumer satisfaction and overall profit. Add to that crazy-sounding control schemes - which maybe is kinda normal in a country like the US without real employee protection laws, but is unthinkable in less free market capitalist societies. Not sure why you defend your employer here. If the problem is real - which I'm in no position to judge - it would be in his best interest to notice it.
  - bearcobra 9y ago
    Anecdotally, I have experienced the same phenomenon at several major grocery chains in Canada. City gets hit with a winter storm and Safeway, SuperStore, & Walmart all had empty produce & bread sections. I've also seen it in certain stores during summer months in the run up to a long weekend. Not saying the new supply chain software can't be the cause, but there does seem to be other reasonable explanations.
    - onli 9y ago
      During a canadian winter storm to have more than usual empty shelves is of course very reasonable ;) And I'm also used to having less products available in some supermarkets when nearing night time. The images shown in the article though seem ridiculous to me. But I agree, absolutely possible that there are other explanations (including that there is no problem at all), but a wrongly prioritized supply chain scheme/software fits very well to the shown and described issues.
    - kolbe 9y ago
      If those are the companies we should compare Whole Foods to, then I will stop going to Whole Foods and save 50%
    - biiirdtime 9y ago
      Are you from the Fraser Valley by any chance?
  - tinfins 9y ago
    So you think stores should just keep a huge backstock of fresh produce just in case an extreme weather event or some other rare issue hits? That's going to lead to less fresh produce for the 350 days a year when everything goes smoothly. The OTS system in the article also allows for exceptions - if there were bananas available the store could have stocked up on them. It's just so wrong on many levels - I could spend all day pointing them out, but this thread is getting bigger than I thought and I don't know if I can spend much more time on it. I was going to edit my original comment with more information but it doesn't look like I can anymore.
- gamblor956 9y ago
  The header image where the veggie section is basically empty is actually from Houston, so I'm going to assume that you're being willfully blind about the issues raised in the article. It's not a regional issue, it's systemic.
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
- dgacmu 9y ago
  The article came out a day or so after I went to the Whole Foods in Pittsburgh, and for the first time, when the cashier asked if I'd found everything, I said quite strongly: "No!". There were really surprising gaps in availability -- there was no soy milk (fresh or shelf-stable), no rice milk, no stock of several types of yogurt, surprisingly slim pickings in several of the veggie sections, no vegetable stock, only the most expensive types of diced tomatoes left (no 365 brand), and a few other things. The cashier said it was probably because the delivery truck didn't make it the previous day because of snow, but was surprised because the truck had made it earlier that day. IANA whole foods employee, but this certainly jibes with reduced stocking levels increasing fragility under delivery misses. I've never seen my WFM that empty before.
rdiddly 9y ago
Well, it's the result of a decision made by a company that was, at the time, having some difficulty competing, and was desperately trying to cut prices, and then soon thereafter, sold itself to Amazon. So the resemblance is not altogether coincidental.

dingaling 9y ago

Why are they resetting a section during shopping hours? Even 30 years ago when I was a student worker in a food store that sort of task only happened after 22:00 when the last customers had left.

briandear 9y ago
Not particularly relevant to the article, but a fun fact is that in France -- there's no such thing as after hours reseting in grocery stores. When the store closes -- everyone goes home.
ethbro 9y ago
If store sales > shelf capacity, you have to intraday restock.
tinfins 9y ago
Most meat teams at WFM don't have overnight crews. The thing is too, it's a snapshot. We don't know how long it looked like that, what time of the day it was, whether someone called out sick, etc.
donarb 9y ago
A lot of grocery stores have non-employees stocking shelves now, usually during the day. These are reps from the vendors, like potato chips or specialty foods that rent shelf space in the store are and responsible for maintaining them.