So it begins

Hello everyone,
Yes, today I went on a Safeway. And this marks the true start of my blog's content. But before we get to that, I have something to say. I am glad that I didn't work for Costco, because today we needed some things that would last us more than a week for our house, and that place is so easy to pick apart.

Now to the main course. Today was a fine day to go shopping, the weather sucks, the kids were all still in class and the rent was due, so writing a larger check wasn't such a big deal. When I worked for Safeway, they were in the process of modernizing the look of their stores in an attempt to make them all look the same, much like Target did in order to make stores familiar to all shoppers no matter where they needed to shop. Well Safeway has done this, but has neglected to keep isles in the same order. When i worked it was a routine to know which isle was for what and what items were in that isle, that way when someone needed to know where something you could tell them or take them to the item.

So we were looking for cornbread to make when we have chili. We ended up finding it, but there is a specific section the mixes are usually in. In the store that I worked in the mixes for the corn bread was in the baking isle toward the back next to the powdered puddings. I was looking for the cornbread mix as I was walking along the open refrigerated meat displays when i passed four different isles. I looked back at my room mates with a puzzled look.

We gave up looking for it temporarily and moved onto the cereal selection. After picking up the Honey Nut Cheerios and the Frosted Flakes I realized what my confusion was. In the baking was reversed. Why couldn't they just make all the stores the same? No they just have to make you spend three times as much time you want to spend in the store, trying to remember where things are.

If Safeway's intention was to make all the stores the same to improve customer recognition of the where items are, then why do this. My belief is that Safeway planned this in order to increase the amount of impulse buys. The lines are also longer and have more useless items in them as well fewer of those lines open, but that is another story in itself.

The new store design is dimmer and makes things seem more sophisticated. The new look really doesn't change the fact that their attempt to make all the stores the same has failed anyway. Any two stores you compare will have something different about them. It could be something as simple as moving the location of the spices to isle 20, or something more noticeable as reversing the order of isles from bakery to produce. This post is dragging on, next time I will make sure to get to the point faster next time. But I have to charge the laptop battery and make my way to the Oakland Athletics game.

So until next shop, always take help out to your car. Offer to tip the person who helps. If they accept say you are a secret shopper and that if they take it they will get fired. Watch the expression on their face. They aren't supposed to take it because of a union policy.