Home Depot Article - Link

[Tom Watson]

Tom Tom Watson - Woodworker Gulph Mills, Pennsylvania

[Bob Schmall]

"Store manager Marsh said his 210 employees in Germantown, Md., had boosted sales of carpets, kitchens and gardening products by providing advice and keeping shelves stocked."

Gee, what a clever idea. Now maybe they can start advertising that they provide help to the customer. What? They've been saying this for years? Never mind.

Bob

[Kevin Craig]

to try to cut waiting time, and employees who had worked checkout are being moved onto the sales floor to assist customers."

If they leave one checker in place for full service (or to monitor the self-checkout lanes), that will free up exactly one employee for the sales floor. There is never more than two checkers working at my local HD (beats Lowe's, which usually has one).

The one person freed up for the sales floor will be mighty busy, too, since no one else is working the floor.

Kevin

[Rico]

My local HD has the self checkout machines. 4 machines monitored by one employee. And usually about 2 to 4 manned registers open. Self checkout only makes sense in stores that do a lot of business. The self checkout works better than I expected, but it's still one more reason for me to try Lowes first since HD and Lowes are only about 1/4 mile apart here.

Rico

[Kevin Craig]

Yeah buddy, you tell 'em!

We should just do away with department managers, store managers, district managers, regional managers, vice presidents, presidents, CEOs, board members, chairmen of the boards... and probably stockholders too!

None of those people do a damn thing to earn their money. It's all the drone on the floor making minimum wage. Let's just let the workers hire themselves, train themselves, schedule their hours, decide what products to carry, set stocking levels and re-order levels, raise capital to secure a location and build the store, contract with suppliers and negotiate the best deals and otherwise be responsible for everything, including making a profit (or eating the loss).

Waitaminnit... if they're doing all that, they're in charge, which means they're MANAGERS, right? And they might just need a little help doing the things that involve more sweat and less business acumen. So, they have to hire... EMPLOYEES, right?

Yeah, you tell 'em, John. You really hit the nail on the head.

Kevin

[Silvan]

I hope some day I'm working in a restaurant, and you're eating there, so I can piss in your food.

[John]

I live in the area and have been in the Germantown store. It's one of the worst, if not the worst, HD I've ever been in. Items are laying all over the place, the stores always dirty, and good luck finding anyone to help you. It sounds to me like "Store manager Marsh" is just toting his own horn. At least he gave the credit to the employees.

If any of you do live in the area, try the Leesburg, Va store. From where I live, it's about an equal distance from my home as the Germantown store. It is, by far, the best HD I've ever been in. I was so impressed by the look of the store and the helpfulness of the employees that I sent the HD main office a letter.

Jo

[Rick Chamberlain]

Self checkout - good concept in principle, bad in application.

At one of our HD stores they have 4 self checkout bays. One store employee oversees the 4 bays. She is running around like a chicken with her head cut off because of the way items have to be scanned in. If you get anything without a barcode - like cut electrical wire, for example - the clerk has to authorize it. I know - keeps shoplifting down, but it sure slows up the line.

And since there is only 1 clerk for the 4 bays, I figure it takes about

50% longer to check out at the self checkout line than if you waited at the full service counter.

Too bad really - I make my living working with computers and software, and while the idea of ringing up my own items and leaving quickly is appealing, it just doesn't work that way now.

Rick Chamberlain

[Kevin Craig]

But the customer is *busy* for that time. Standing passively while someone else does something slowly just makes most people do the slow burn, even if doing it themselves would take longer.

Kevin

[Mark]

"Home Depot is installing self-checkout lanes in 800 stores this year to try to cut waiting time, and employees who had worked checkout are being moved onto the sales floor to assist customers."

They've installed this system at my local HD. Boy it makes using those stollen credit cards a lot easier. Mark

[Larry Jaques]

On Thu, 21 Aug 2003 11:20:44 -0400, Silvan pixelated:

You just proved Kev's point, Mikey.

- The advantage of exercising every day is that you die healthier. ------------

Dynamic Websites, PHP Apps, MySQL databases

[Kevin Craig]

I do that will full service. We've all been slowed down by items without stickers (either our items, or someone's in front of us); I don't know why anyone wouldn't make that a routine part of shopping.

Kevin

[Edwin Pawlowski]

Yes, the are easy enough to locate. They are usually pasted over the instructions or other important information that you'd want to read. Ed

[Brian Henderson]

My only problem with the self-checkout lanes is that they are SO SLOW! They need a "not a complete moron" setting so that you don't have to listen to them "scan an item and put it in a bag" crap for every single item you have!