The receipt check thing makes sense for Costco’s business model. They run with a relatively low gross margin, but assure vendors of an equal share of wallet. That’s one of the reasons why vendors like to work with them, as opposed to Wallmart, which takes the lions’ share of the margin, pressuring vendors. However, if you’re running at a low gross margin, you really have to make sure to minimize loss. High-margin retail stores budget in loss as part of the cost of doing business. Costco can’t really afford to do that and still pay their vendors & employees well.
3 Likes
Indeed it is what I meant
What would you have them call it in a legal document? A common joke is that our core competency is that “We Sell Shit” not that the quality is shit but that it is just a colorful way of getting to the core of what we do. That phrasing however would probably not get past legal
It’s useful to remember that everything is not only worse than you think it is, but in ways you haven’t yet considered.
Then you leave out the bit where they often actually catch customers being overcharged. As if we should feel sorry for the cashiers being double checked?
Well when they catch that someone was overcharged 100 or 1000 dollars, it probably improves that shoppers experience quite a bit. I’d say enough to justify your inconvenience.
2 Likes
It’s called “clickbait”.
1 Like
Whenever I see that on one of Rob’s posts I just bypass the article completely.
3 Likes
Agreed. It was fun for a while, but it’s waaaaaay past its sell-by date.
1 Like
The dynamics couldn’t be more different, though - the high-end department store is giving you lots of attention upfront (which also involves eyeballing you to make sure you aren’t stealing anything) and a careful check-out process that might involve individually deactivating anti-theft tags and, you know, not buying 50+ items.
1 Like
for scholarship porpoises
I just ignore them and walk past. They’ve declined to chase me so far.
1 Like
Nasty little thieves, they stole our Precious!
2 Likes
In this document I might have said “all receipts and purchases will be inspected”.
That’s perfect! That means anything I didn’t purchase won’t be inspected! 
Shoplifting heaven. I think you have this lawyering thing down 
1 Like
Yes, although with technology, costs can be weird. Inkjet printers are dirt cheap, despite being super-complicated precision devices, yet if you could buy an 8-inch thermal printer, it’d be outlandishly expensive even though it’s just a bundle of hot wires. CRTs used to be cheap, but to buy one now, you’d have to build the factory first.
It’s kind of circular; customers pick the cheapest technology for their purpose, but the cheapest technology is whatever lots of customers buy. If retailers had happened to fix on neutral-particle-beam printing, then that would now be cheap. I exaggerate slightly but my point is, if you move far enough beyond local minima, all kinds of alternative technologies are feasible, which can be exciting, even to committed Capitalists.
3 Likes
So you don’t actually just enjoy wearing the turtleneck? Are you sure you’re really super dark?
1 Like
Was the stamp the same for every group that entered? In high school I worked at a popular children’s pizza and games franchise, and occasionally had to work the door. We always did exit checks to verify that no one left with someone else’s child. Each group that entered got a different number stamped on their hand and we were supposed to check that they matched on the way out.
In practice this felt more “security theater” (even though that wasn’t a coined term at the time) than any real check, most stamps were so smudged that you could barely make out what the numbers were supposed to be.
I’m pretty sure there was only one stamp, and we had bought some produce at the shop on the way out and I was alone, carrying the heavy stuff on ahead while my wife and daughter picked out a few more things. They stopped me with a crate of strawberries and a pumpkin and wanted to see my stamp.
Ever since Gillette figured out the real money wasn’t in the handles. It was in the blades.
1 Like
Yeah, me too. I already check the bill when it’s being rung up, myself.
