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community weblog
Self-Checkout
More Consumers Stealing From Self-Checkout, With Many Blaming Higher Prices (LendingTree survey) , 27% of self-checkout users have purposefully taken an item without scanning, according to a LendingTree survey of 2,050 U.S. consumers. Alarmingly, unaffordable essentials (47%) and price increases tied to tariffs (46%) are the main motivations for doing so.
A few more interesting bits
Theft is one thing, but accusations are another. Among self-checkout users, 14% say they've been accused of taking an item without scanning, even though they didn't take anything. Meanwhile, 9% say they were accused and had taken something, and 7% say they weren't accused despite having taken items.
The conclusions of the corporate sponsored article of course amount to "stealing is wrong" which is, imo, a loaded phrase.
Previously
posted by tiny frying pan on Dec 05, 2025 at 5:12 AM
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Wanted to include this, but can't get an archive link to work
The One Line Americans (Weirdly) Choose to Wait In
posted by tiny frying pan at 5:13 AM
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Remember, kids. If you see someone manually keying 4011 on non banana produce, no you fucking didn't.
posted by phunniemee at 5:21 AM
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The way I look at it, corporate grocery chains are asking me to perform unpaid, untrained labour. If I "accidentally" fail to scan a few of the more expensive items in my basket, that's the cost of offloading once-paid positions onto their customer base.
posted by sunimplodes at 5:25 AM
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I lived in a low-income area of the California desert for three years. ALL of the self-checkout options at local retailers were removed mid-2023.
posted by infinitewindow at 5:31 AM
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How on earth does anyone manage to steal from a self-checkout? I've been caught by the system enough times without stealing anything--just from, I guess, moving my arm in a suspicious way--that it seems like pretty tight surveillance? Or is this one of those things where the system notes you stealing, does a bit of face recognition, and waits for you to steal enough to be charged with a felony?
posted by mittens at 5:34 AM
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The way I look at it, corporate grocery chains are asking me to perform unpaid, untrained labour. If I "accidentally" fail to scan a few of the more expensive items in my basket, that's the cost of offloading once-paid positions onto their customer base.
This is exactly right. I would add that in some contexts (grocery stores, primarily) you're also imposing an additional time tax on every shopper by forcing them to wait for a customer to scan and bag dozens of items, a job that previously would have taken 1/5 the time with an actual clerk and bagger. So there's another thing that some shoppers are going to "compensate" themselves for.
posted by saladin at 5:38 AM
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Here's a gift link for tiny frying pan's Atlantic article.The One Line Americans (Weirdly) Choose to Wait In
posted by amk at 5:38 AM
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I've become very averse to asking other people to do things for fear of coming off as demanding or putting even more stress on someone who's probably already overworked. The self-checkout is an opportunity to make sure all my groceries that need refrigeration end up in the insulated bags and the bread gets put on top of a bag so it doesn't get squished without having to be that guy.
Market Basket famously doesn't have self checkouts because they believe people should be checked out by people, but MB is also obsessive about sticking those little orange dots on everything that isn't bagged, so I'm guessing the checkout decision probably has more to do with loss prevention than hospitality or employment.
posted by RonButNotStupid at 5:40 AM
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I do self checkout about once every other year, if I have fewer than 5 items and the other lines are really long.
posted by SoberHighland at 5:42 AM
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mittens: "How on earth does anyone manage to steal from a self-checkout? "
An item fails to scan, the system one is on doesn't beep, amid dozens of ambient beeps from other checkouts, an employee meant to be watching either notices or doesn't; an alarm goes off at the exit or doesn't, another security employee who is there or not there fails to react.
A few days ago an alarm went off as a woman left an Aldi I was at - she stopped, turned towards the employee there with a questioning face, ready to show her receipt - waved on her way.
posted by tiny frying pan at 5:43 AM
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Thanks for the gift link, amk!
posted by tiny frying pan at 5:44 AM
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I wonder if the longer lines for self-checkout have something to do with self-checkouts (near me, at least) operating on a single line basis. You get to the front of the line, you go to the next open checkout. If you choose a cashiered lane, you're stuck there unless you decide to move to another line, which just starts the waiting over again.
posted by punchtothehead at 5:46 AM
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Turns out Ontario courts don't support punitive civil penalties for shoplifting. There goes my "force shoppers to shoplift via poor self checkout" business plan.
posted by NotAYakk at 5:52 AM
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It s gotta be easier to steal from a cashier checkout than self checkout, no?
posted by eustatic at 5:52 AM
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How on earth does anyone manage to steal from a self-checkout?
During the pandemic I walked out of the store with some muffins I forgot to scan at the self checkout. They were at the back of the cart and I must have overlooked them. And they were quickly obscured by bags of groceries I had scanned so I didn't realize my mistake until I got back to the car.
posted by RonButNotStupid at 5:53 AM
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eustatic: "It s gotta be easier to steal from a cashier checkout than self checkout, no?"
I have NO idea how you would steal from a cashier checkout, honestly.
posted by tiny frying pan at 5:56 AM
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Breaking News from The Onion: Too Late Now To Switch From Checkout Line With Talkative Cashier
posted by JoeZydeco at 5:57 AM
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It really depends on the store. In the nearby metro area, Walmart often has an employee standing in the staging area watching, as do the busier Cub Foods stores. But come to my small town after the busy evening hours and you might have to chase someone down at either location to help you with a problem on those things. Both have drastically cut the number of real cashiers even during the day.
posted by soelo at 6:04 AM
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Pro tip: when buying organic groceries, key them in as non organic. Boom! Savings.
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 6:09 AM
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I have NO idea how you would steal from a cashier checkout, honestly.
posted by tiny frying pan at
Oh sure sure. Tell it to the judge.
It is curious that there s not a comparison with existing shoplifting rates. the conclusion is assumed to be true because most people think it is true. This is not the surest method for coming to correct conclusions.
I would agree with the Atlantic article, lines are due to in reased preference for social isolation.
And of course people are shoplifting more as food taxes go up, that s just simple budgeting.
posted by eustatic at 6:12 AM
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I lived in a low-income area of the California desert for three years. ALL of the self-checkout options at local retailers were removed mid-2023.
I was once ratioed here on Metafilter, and then the comment deleted with a stern warning from the mods, for saying that there was a correlation between the low-income section of town and theft at the self-checkout, but I guess now that I have an article as evidence it should be OK
I wasn't even being very accusatory or anything, because I strongly believe in "if you see someone stealing food, no you didn't" philosophy. F*ck Wal-Mart, Target, Coburns, etc. Self-checkouts are a payroll-reducing scheme, make it more expensive for them so somebody in your community might have an opportunity to get a job.
(Like many of you, I avoided self-checkout for a long time because there was always an error or problem when I used them. One of the Catch 22s was where they force you to buy something in the department (electronics, makeup, pharmacy) but then the self-checkout camera sees that you didn't pay for an 'item'. I may be cursed to always pick the slowest cashier-attended lane, but I generally don't go to self-checkouts for a myriad of reasons).
posted by AzraelBrown at 6:12 AM
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eustatic: "Oh sure sure. Tell it to the judge."
I literally don't? A cashier is there. Ringing up the groceries? How does one steal? I'm not asking to find out so I can steal, literally don't see how that works. I trust the industry knows which one results in more theft, since it's their business to know.
posted by tiny frying pan at 6:18 AM
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In Canada, I am pretty sure at least half the motivation for stealing from self-checkout is just 'Fuck Galen Weston'.
posted by jacquilynne at 6:23 AM
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When my kid was little and sat in the grocery cart, I'd occasionally find items that he was holding and then placed on the seat next to him. I'd discover the accidental shoplifting when we were getting into the car.
posted by JoeZydeco at 6:29 AM
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Eh, inventory in grocery stores is notoriously hard to track. Plus as long as the cost of wages to run the self check out is lower than the cost of the extra stolen goods...
Also the folks running grocery stores are just as likely to ignore or misinterpret reality in favor of their pet theories as anyone else.
posted by Gygesringtone at 6:37 AM
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I literally don't? A cashier is there. Ringing up the groceries? How does one steal? I'm not asking to find out so I can steal, literally don't see how that works
Leave that big thing of seltzer on the bottom of the cart!
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 6:43 AM
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Let us remember that the "shoplifting is out of control" panic that's been a regular feature of "the news" since approximately the lifting of COVID quarantine measures wasn't well supported by actual numbers and data.
posted by Western Infidels at 6:43 AM
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This all gets accounted for in margin. The grocery stores will just raise prices to cover it. When you buy stuff, you're paying for everyone else's shoplifting. Like, I get it, but the stuff gets paid for one way or another. Walmart and Kroger don't lose here, they just spread the cost around.
posted by Slinga at 6:47 AM
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Walmart and Kroger don't lose here, they just spread the cost around.
Socialism!
posted by mittens at 6:49 AM
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This all gets accounted for in margin. The grocery stores will just raise prices to cover it. When you buy stuff, you're paying for everyone else's shoplifting. Like, I get it, but the stuff gets paid for one way or another. Walmart and Kroger don't lose here, they just spread the cost around.
I wonder about this; my assumption is that grocery stores are always charging as much as they think they can and keeping as much profit as they are able and so you actually are cutting into their profits rather than raising other prices if you shoplift (I don't but I don't care that other people do). If they thought they could charge more why wouldn't they, shoplifting or not? But people believe that shoplifting increases prices so it's beneficial to corporations if it seems prevalent because then people blame each other for rising costs rather than greed.
I will caveat my thoughts here by saying that I am not an economist and have never taken an economics class. Whether that makes me more or less qualified to opine is left as an exercise for the reader.
posted by an octopus IRL at 6:55 AM
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We always use the cashier, and having to bring your own shopping bags has lead to us finding items that inadvertently got buried under or mixed up with shopping bags in the cart.
posted by fimbulvetr at 6:56 AM
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> This all gets accounted for in margin. The grocery stores will just raise prices to cover it
Not how it works. Grocery stores will set prices to maximize profits. If they could raise prices and make more money, they will, regardless of how much shoplifting occurs. And if lowering prices makes more money? Same.
Shoplifting raises their cost of goods. It also grows with higher prices.
So dProfit/dPrice = (price-cost of good)*d RateOfSale / dPrice
Cost of Good = (stocking + inventory + wholesale)*(1-lossage), and shoplifting shows up as an increasing function of price in lossage.
Nowhere should a store multiply the cost of good by a margin factor to set a retail price, unless they are not great at setting prices. They may calculate said margins... but using it to price goods is pretty incompent, no large chain should fall for that error.
Increased shoplifting can change prices; but it ain't linear.
posted by NotAYakk at 7:06 AM
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Yeah, aside from actual theft, shit just happens at the self-checkout line.
Sometimes unintentionally.
I get these big water jugs from Meijer. I always trigger the theft warning because I leave the jug in the cart and the "cart not empty" thing calls for the cashier. The other day, I had cheap kitchen trashcan on the back of the cart, too, that I had forgotten about since it was in a spot I never put things on the cart and I was kind of blocking it with my legs. The cashier cleared the error for the jug, I paid and left and then realized I never scanned the trash can. Oh well.
Sometimes intentionally.
The water jugs are a "return empty, get ticket and full jug" thing. But the ticket dispenser NEVER works. I have to grab a cashier to scan a barcode from a book and half the time they don't know where the book is. So, sometimes, I just enter the code for a water jug. But for a Meijer brand self-fill water jug that's like $2 vs. $7. Because get your shit together, Primo.
posted by charred husk at 7:07 AM
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Each of the big three grocery corps in Canada has multiple store name brands at multiple "customer profiles," all selling 95% the same product, at wildly different prices, with completely different branding and promotions. You'll see the same product in e.g. a NoFrills in the community housing district for $5 and three blocks away in the Loblaws flashship store it'll be $9.50. Same owner (galen fucking weston). They all do it, though. Food Basics is the cheap Metro. FreshCo is the cheap Sobeys. Same products, different markups. And the games they play with weekly sales. I just wanna [redacted] the lot of them.
I don't try to shoplift, but if it does happen inadvertently, I'm just going to shrug and get on with my day. And I certainly don't see anyone else shoplifting, and if someone needs to leave the store and is having a hard time using strangely placed doors or one-way gates, I'm happy to help them with this accessibility issue.
posted by seanmpuckett at 7:09 AM
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I can see why they didn't break this out by race or income, because that would just lead to a lot of bigoted media garbage, but I do wish I could see the racial breakout of who gets falsely accused of stealing and who gets caught. I have definitely had interactions with staff that are all "oh not you" when I see them scrutinizing people of color and people who look working class.
Of course it's really paying one part of the working class to police the other part - the people who have to stand there all day staring at the self checkouts aren't exactly millionaires.
Many people can ring up fancy apples as red delicious, for instance. Some people might have done this a few times out of sheer annoyance because their preferred apples simply weren't in the goddamn machine and they did not feel like waiting.
Some people used to prefer the cashiers before the pandemic but got out of the habit because when they were in line for the cashier they just could not handle getting crowded by sneezing unmasked people.
posted by Frowner at 7:23 AM
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As an out and proud Luddite, I refuse to use the fucking things on principle.
posted by flabdablet at 7:23 AM
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I trust the industry knows which one results in more theft, since it's their business to know.
Wasn't there some big report out a while ago about self-checkout shrinkage rates being much higher than expected and that the companies who originally sold self-checkouts to retail stores may have *gasp* downplayed the actual rates in order to speed adoption and get the sale?
posted by RonButNotStupid at 7:23 AM
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The Kroger and HEB around here all use scales on the self checkout so they more or less know if the bag weighs what it's supposed to. (HEB lets you leave sodas and other heavy things in the cart, though.) I also use the HEB pharmacy, so almost every time I go shopping, I have a bag in my cart too, and they don't care.
Wal-mart doesn't use scales, so if I were to shoplift, I'd probably go there.
Fiesta doesn't do self checkout apparently.
posted by Spike Glee at 7:28 AM
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Clarifying that I know many, many white middle class (even if temporarily broke) people who shoplift/who have shoplifted and almost no one has ever been caught, and therefore I surmise that if you look at the people who are accused or caught for shoplifting with these machines, it will be disproportionately and inaccurately working class people and people of color.
I've mostly figured that I shouldn't shoplift if I don't need to, since the more shoplifting goes on the more scrutiny there will be and therefore people will get caught more.
I do remember and regret giving a friend a hard time in college for shoplifting a couple of textbooks. I, of course, had money for textbooks without really feeling the pinch; my friend technically could have paid but it would have been a stretch. That friendship was an extremely educational one in many ways and cured me of at least three or four of my dumber attitudes. (Many more to go, of course, but at least not "give people a hard time for shoplifting to meet their needs").
posted by Frowner at 7:50 AM
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The first and only time I watched someone take something from a self checkout it did not look like she came in with a plan to steal. She tried to scan her rotisserie chicken. It wouldn't scan. She looked for someone to help her. There was no one. She looked at the huge line at all the manned checkout lines, and at the giant line to self checkout she'd just waited in. Then she took the chicken and walked out the door. I have to assume some amount of theft is a reaction to frustration.
posted by lepus at 7:57 AM
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She looked for someone to help her. There was no one.
At my local store, they generally only run half the self-scans, I guess because one person can only handle so many problems--and they don't want to have more than one person staffing the registers? So not only do you not get help very quickly, but there are big lines to scan.
posted by mittens at 8:25 AM
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My local grocery has self checkout but they are now the 10 items of less lines.
I don't use them as a general principle but recently while at CVS I had to use the damn thing because there were zero clerks at the front, and in fact the store was so small I knew there was no one there but people behind the pharmacy.
posted by 922257033c4a0f3cecdbd819a46d626999d1af4a at 8:35 AM
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"As an out and proud Luddite, I refuse to use the fucking things on principle." - you and me both sister (or brother, or non-binary friend).
And hmmm, curious about the sponsor of this 'study'? Academic lab? Economics 'institute'? Oh, sleezeball 'lending' company with an interest in getting as many regular people in deep debt to them as possible?
posted by WatTylerJr at 8:41 AM
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I am nothing but a humble customer. It is not my job to know that the good, vine ripened tomatoes are not the same as romas.
posted by nestor_makhno at 8:41 AM
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How on earth does anyone manage to steal from a self-checkout?
In the systems I know, every scanned item immediately goes onto the platform that's a scale, and the increase is calibrated to an average weight for that item. My local just upgraded to a tare system that measure your bag's weight (since so many want to place each item scanned directly into their shopping bag). So
An item fails to scan
...doesn't happen (unless it's still in the shopping cart or hidden elsewhere, so was never scanned or weighed). But
when buying organic groceries, key them in as non organic
This is where most Self Check-out 'savings' are realized. Who among us has memorized codes for the cheaper produce?
I know many, many white middle class people who shoplift/who have shoplifted and almost no one has ever been caught
What was Jerry's mother's excuse in that early Seinfeld? "Batteries are too expensive!"
posted by Rash at 8:49 AM
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In Canada, I am pretty sure at least half the motivation for stealing from self-checkout is just 'Fuck Galen Weston'.
And if you're in Canada, remember that cheese is free at any shop owned by the Weston family.
posted by TheWhiteSkull at 8:52 AM
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In our corner of Portland, the only grocery store that has gotten rid of self-checkout is the super-budget one, the dreary fluorescent warehousey one where you can practically fill a cart for the cost of a single bag at Whole Foods.
Also, remember: 9 means organic!
posted by gottabefunky at 8:54 AM
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> I lived in a low-income area of the California desert for three years. ALL of the self-checkout options at local retailers were removed mid-2023.
one obvious solution :P
more of these...
San Francisco's Only Free Grocery Store Is Featured in a New PBS Special - "The D10 Market opened in San Francisco's Bayview neighborhood in 2024. Funded by the city through the San Francisco Human Services Agency, the store is considered the first of its kind in the nation."
Inside the 4,000-square-foot grocery store, a dedicated team of staff and volunteers stocks wares and carefully curates produce displays, just like at any other supermarket. Shoppers must first apply for a membership card, which Morris compared to the "Costco model"[*] — eligibility requirements include living in nearby zip codes and proof of public assistance. Unlike many food banks and pantries, where choices may be limited or people are just handed boxes of standards, the D10 Market aims to source goods that serve the communities' needs, according to Morris.
"We weigh how many pounds of food you are leaving with, and then we document what is being taken out, so that we know how to scale up," she said. "We have great partnerships with Grocery Outlet and several other boutique markets throughout. So we have just an abundance of resources, and the level of choice is ridiculous."
The community effort, run by Bayview Senior Services, was born out of food insecurity concerns that have continued to make headlines, especially during the recent government shutdown, which delayed federal food assistance benefits for millions of Californians. Discounted, government-run grocery stores have also become a key part of the affordability agenda proposed by New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani.
The D10 Market is now featured in a new PBS special, hosted by James Beard Award-winning chef Lidia Bastianich, called Lidia Celebrates America: A Nation of Neighbors, which makes its broadcast television debut on Tuesday, Nov. 25. In the show, Bastianich profiles a handful of community-oriented food efforts, including a pay-what-you-can kitchen in Denver, Colorado; a hub for Japanese Americans in Portland, Oregon; and a daily meal drive for survivors displaced by the Los Angeles wildfires earlier this year.
also btw...
-NYC may get city-owned grocery stores. Do they work?
-Inside Atlanta's First Government-Funded Supermarket
posted by kliuless at 8:56 AM
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I don't like self-checkout and I regularly enjoy shorter lines in the cashier lane. I also don't mind small talk. At shops with conveyor belt checkouts I try to arrange my groceries from the cart in a way that I think makes it easier for cashiers to scan/bag. Having spent most of my low-wage earning years on the retail side of the service sector, I never really minded ringing people up or chatting with people while doing so. It keeps you busy and your shift goes faster.
posted by Thivaia 2.0 at 9:19 AM
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So here in Ann Arbor, MI:
- the local Meijer at self-checkouts have staff pretty much itching to scan heavy-ish items in your cart. Had one remarkable instance where they just walked up and tapped the screen to start and I had to tell them no
- Costco here has staff on hand to do a similar thing in advance for their self-checkouts, outside of the usual front-door check... I only mention them here because...
- Wife and I took a trip to the Twin Cities, Minnesota for a wedding this past October, and we stopped by a Costco there, where I just stood there dazed and confused for a few seconds as staff just scanned shit at a supposed self-checkout station.
So... things are getting interesting
posted by JoeXIII007 at 9:20 AM
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RETURN ITEM TO BAGGING AREA
WAIT FOR ATTENDANT
posted by splitpeasoup at 9:25 AM
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I've used the self-check at Costco and I appreciate what they're doing to accelerate the checkout process.
During peak times the staff tells you to keep everything in your cart and they run a handheld scanner over your items while you fiddle with the membership card scan and payment. Everything stays in the cart and you're through a lot quicker, which to Costco means a HUGE deal. Every wasted minute costs them revenue.
posted by JoeZydeco at 9:29 AM
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I have to assume some amount of theft is a reaction to frustration.
I was at a local grocery store maybe a year ago and was trying to buy a container of strawberries at self-checkout and it wouldn't scan. I went to the produce menu and there was an option for strawberries, and I selected it, and it seemed to work and give a reasonable price so I went on with my scanning.
After I paid, an employee came up to me and said something snotty to me about the strawberries, and it turned out the produce menu price was 20 cents lower than the accurate price. I cheerfully apologized and offered her a quarter, and she looked actually offended, as if I had called her a name.
A manager came over, and they punched a bunch of buttons and glared at me, as if they were convinced I had come in with this nefarious plan to save 20 cents on a ~$35 grocery purchase, and ultimately refused additional payment. It seemed very strange, and a couple of months later that store got rid of self checkout.
posted by smelendez at 9:32 AM
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I am not sure how I could accidentally or on purpose steal anything from a self-checkout as I always use a reusable bag and if I would try to put anything in it that I didn't scan, it's not going to let me continue scanning until I take out the offending item that added weight without scanning. I guess I could wait until after I paid and then put it in there? Anyway, does this mean I am not trying hard enough to steal from Galen Weston? Because I'd be happy to keep trying because fuck that guy.
posted by Kitteh at 9:37 AM
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You steal our cashier jobs we still your fucking groceries
posted by latkes at 9:47 AM
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I believe in theft (I mean come on, evilDoug, right?) corporations have been stealing wages as long as I'm alive, and now there are our friends, the billionaires, who want us to know, that stealing is bad, if it's done by someone with a lower net worth than theirs.
I don't shoplift, out of laziness. I stand by people who do as patriots and (occasionally) martyrs. I have been known, however, to download or stream things from non standard channels.
Someday, there will be a reckoning. Unfortunately that day is not today. Until then my friends, take what you need, especially if it will inconvenience or irritate a billionaire.
posted by evilDoug at 9:58 AM
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Our local grocery chain put in self-scan aisles about 2 years ago. I kept going through the staffed checkouts and eyeballing the self-checkouts until one day I made an offhand comment to the employee, asking how many staff were let go after the self-checkout was added. She said "none, actually" which surprised me. Turns out the store owner figured out he could improve morale and reduce workload by adding the self-checkout lanes, keeping the employees he had while making them a little less busy.
So now I do not feel bad using the self-checkout lanes at that store. I still avoid them elsewhere.
posted by caution live frogs at 10:09 AM
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Anatole France: "The law, in its majestic equality, forbids the rich as well as the poor to sleep under bridges, to beg in the streets, and to steal bread" or
France in, like, French "La loi, dans un grand souci d'égalité, interdit aux riches comme aux pauvres de coucher sous les ponts, de mendier dans les rues et de voler du pain".
posted by BobTheScientist at 10:13 AM
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Rash: "An item fails to scan
...doesn't happen (unless it's still in the shopping cart or hidden elsewhere, so was never scanned or weighed). But"
Oh man that sounds nice. I have items fail to scan on first try all the time.
posted by tiny frying pan at 10:15 AM
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In Canada, I am pretty sure at least half the motivation for stealing from self-checkout is just 'Fuck Galen Weston'.
I note that the title of the post below this one is "in praise of stealing from thieves."
posted by rpfields at 10:19 AM
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A couple years ago I moved to a neighborhood where we don't have a large chain grocery anywhere super convenient (or at least not convenient for me, as I don't have a car). So I've gotten really used to just regular old checkout with a cashier.
This means that when I make my occasional pilgrimage to the bougie grocery I am 1000% foiled by the self-checkout. It flags me when I move my tote bag too much. It flags me when something falls off the edge of the sensor. It flags me when I reach into my pocket for the money I am using to pay.
And yet the last time I went, I somehow managed to accidentally steal a bouquet of flowers. Literally accidentally -- I had no idea that the second bouquet's code hadn't scanned, the sensor didn't complain of an extra item, and if their cameras saw it they said nothing. I didn't even know it until I looked at the receipt later for another reason and saw only 1x "Floral" on the list.
So much surveillance and annoyance to prevent precisely nothing at all.
posted by We put our faith in Blast Hardcheese at 10:19 AM
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Walmart implemented self-checkout that actually functions properly years ago. I think they mostly use cameras for detecting what you're doing, but it's fast and works 99% of the time. Most other grocery self-checkouts are garbage because of stupid weight sensors and the like. Actually, Aldi does a good job too, in my experience. Also no weight-based scans. I have no idea if these stores experience higher theft via self-checkout than others.
During the pandemic, we switched to curbside service at Walmart, and haven't gone back because we hate going into the store. Now when I do have to go inside, I'd guess it's about 50% shoppers, 50% employees. They have a huge number of people doing curbside shopping in the store, all the time, at any hour of the day. Often there are more of them than there are shoppers. So, if anything, I feel like the number of employees must have increased, despite the self-checkout lanes.
Interestingly, for a while Walmart offered a branded credit card with 5% cash back on items ordered for online delivery or for curbside delivery, but only 3% for items bought inside the store. That initially didn't make sense to me, because the labor cost must be higher for curbside, but obviously they must figure there's virtually no theft with the curbside orders so they can afford more cash back. Of course, they cancelled that card.
A note on the study: no one yet has commented directly on the much higher rate of theft by people earning $100k or more. That's interesting to me. Is that the fuck-you, got-mine attitude of the wealthy?
posted by dellsolace at 10:37 AM
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My annoyance is the self checkout weighs the items, but the space to set them down is so small. If you have anything big or a lot of items it won't fit on there. I'd use the cashier lane but it's just that: a (1) lane. One cashier. So everyone who doesn't want to use or can't use the self checkout has to go to that single cashier and there's usually a long line. It shouldn't be this difficult to buy groceries.
posted by downtohisturtles at 10:48 AM
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I loathe the self-checkout for its slowness and constant surveillance and high error rate—You waved your hand over your cart! Straight to jail!—and always avoided them until I moved close to a QFC in Portland where the hiring manager seems to have a preference for the most socially awkward and deeply weird applicants. Every checkout is a coin flip between being interrogated at length about what I will do with the kale in my cart (in Portland! Kale's all we eat!) and being stared at, silently, through the entire transaction. I'm happy the store doesn't discriminate on strictly neurotypical grounds, and the employees are all capable and efficient, but sometimes, when I only have a couple items and the Silent Starer is working checkout, I endure the humiliation of self-checkout just to save myself the awkward interaction.
I've never stolen from that QFC, at least not intentionally. Safeway, however....
posted by Just the one swan, actually at 11:11 AM
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A note on the study: no one yet has commented directly on the much higher rate of theft by people earning $100k or more. That's interesting to me. Is that the fuck-you, got-mine attitude of the wealthy?
I can't imagine these rates are anywhere near accurate so I wouldn't buy into them at all (I'd steal them!!!)
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 11:14 AM
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The supermarket I mostly go to has (on a good day) two staffed registers open, and half a dozen self-checkouts. They also offer scan-as-you-shop. I started doing that a couple years ago and never looked back. Scan and bag as I go, just scan the barcode and pay to check out.
Maybe two or three times a year I get "audited" where someone has to come scan a few items in my cart while I make small talk to distract them. Even then, it would be very, very easy to walk out with a bunch of small, high-value items in the bottom of the bags. It wouldn't even be hard to make it look unintentional for the cameras.
posted by uncleozzy at 11:19 AM
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Self checkout sucks and I hate it. Well, ok, I use it when I have so few things that I'm just carrying them in my hands. That's nice I guess.
posted by caviar2d2 at 11:19 AM
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Aldi rolled out self-checkout over the last year in a number of locations, but then rolled it back in most of them. There might have been multiple reasons, but at least one of them is that their cashiers are way faster than us random shoppers. (Note: they don't/won't bag your groceries. They'll put them back in your cart and how you get them home is your own problem. Aldi checkout is a highly idiosyncratic but surprisingly well-tuned machine which apparently found self-checkout incompatible with its basic principles.)
posted by jackbishop at 11:21 AM
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I'm no statistician but when I see reporting like this I'm curious about the underlying study. Lendingtree themselves paid for this, so you're looking at the primary reporting. There's lots of percentages and categorization and finally at the bottom of the article, it says: (emp mine)LendingTree commissioned QuestionPro to conduct an online survey of 2,050 U.S. consumers ages 18 to 79 from Oct. 9 to 13, 2025. The survey was administered using a nonprobability-based sample, and quotas were used to ensure the sample base represented the overall population. Researchers reviewed all responses for quality control.
Wikipedia says this about nonprobability-based sampling: (emp mine)Nonprobability sampling is a form of sampling that does not utilise random sampling techniques where the probability of getting any particular sample may be calculated.
Nonprobability samples are not intended to be used to infer from the sample to the general population in statistical terms.
But right off the bat they say "In fact, 27% of self-checkout users have purposefully taken an item without scanning", not "27% of a small, non-representative sample of self-checkout users have purposefully taken an item without scanning"
posted by achrise at 11:23 AM
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I haven't seen mention yet of the newest generation of these machines which now include cameras that use AI to detect and cross-reference the item being scanned. So basically, the banana trick won't work with your filet mignon because the system can visually identify the difference between the two.
The arms race has now escalated, there's probably a market for a pouch disguised as a bunch of bananas that you can slip your expensive goods into.
posted by jeremias at 11:31 AM
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Here in Galen Weston's world, the self-checkout has been accompanied by locking gates and carts that lock and blare alarms, so much fun. Apparently the cart locks if you haven't spent enough time by the checkout. I've been in the store when one these goes off and you would think a nuclear attack was at hand.
posted by warriorqueen at 11:32 AM
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a pouch disguised as a bunch of bananas
or are you just happy to see me
posted by uncleozzy at 11:40 AM
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I've gone back to the store the next time and asked them to ring me up for things I accidentally got for free on a prior occasion. That said, if anyone wants to steal from Jeff Bezos I am not going to judge.
posted by BrotherCaine at 11:51 AM
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I wonder about this; my assumption is that grocery stores are always charging as much as they think they can and keeping as much profit as they are able
While technically true, the actual margins on groceries are 1.86%. They can juice that return with borrowing ("leverage"), but this does increase tail risk and might cost you the company if hit with a double whammy of disaster and interest rates. Which may or may not actually be bad for society, depending on how many other people in the world are willing to buy a grocery store from your creditors and run it instead of you.
IMO, the categorical imperative applies. If everyone steals 2 dollars for every hundred dollar grocery run, Kroger would be a net loss operation and their rational response would be to close down.
posted by pwnguin at 12:01 PM
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self-checkouts (near me, at least) operating on a single line basis. You get to the front of the line, you go to the next open checkout. If you choose a cashiered lane, you're stuck there unless you decide to move to another line
The cheap No Name supermarket near my place has single line serviced check out. Them and banks are the only ones which is sort of weird bed fellows.
posted by Mitheral at 12:05 PM
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eustatic: “the conclusion is assumed to be true because most people think it is true.”
I also thought this. Yet another imaginary problem.
It occurred to me just now that they put in the self-checkouts because they thought the cashiers were stealing from the till, didn't they?
posted by ob1quixote at 12:29 PM
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No, they just didn't want to pay staff. It's very difficult to steal cash from a till at a large grocery store. Most monitor and record all cashiers via video, and tills are counted and balanced at least twice a day - more during busy times (Saturdays, holidays). If someone's till doesn't balance they're put under close scrutiny immediately. Also, at large stores cashiers generally cannot open the till themselves. It opens automatically only at the end of a cash transaction.
When I worked as a cashier, the biggest thefts* came from very brazen, organized members of the public and staff working out back / in the warehouse. They can steal thousands of dollars worth of merchandise in one go.
*excepting wage theft, which mysteriously is never mentioned in these articles about poor, victimized, huge retailers
posted by Stoof at 12:49 PM
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From The Atlantic article: I spoke with one customer outside a Brooklyn Whole Foods who'd just chosen a seemingly longer self-checkout line because she wanted to be able to zone out and not talk to anyone.
Another example of The Media sticking it to the little guy.
posted by DanSachs at 12:57 PM
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I was working as a cashier at Home Depot when they first put these in and being the attendant was awful. It was like doing your job x4 for no extra pay and people were really mean, too. They also broke down all the time. These will never last, I thought confidently. Well, that was 2010. I'm sure they're still awful to work with even if they don't break down as much as they used to.
I did - or tried to do - a performance art piece at the self checkout at the Ingles on Haywood Road in West Asheville, again in like 2011 or thereabouts. My idea was to get all four machines saying the same thing at once or just a little off, to which end I recruited four friends dressed in black to scan the same things at exactly the same time. Alas we were foiled by the existence of other customers in the store who didn't want to be in an artsy video or wait any extra time to scan their groceries and get out. Philistines. Also it was harder than I thought it would be to get the machine timing right.
All that said, I hates them with a passion for all the reasons everyone has cited. And, I usually have wine in my cart and I don't want to force the poor attendant to come over and check my ID (please note that my children are well and away old enough to drink but in this brave new world you have to actually scan the license.) If after all that nonsense the self checkout machine fails to notice something in the cart who am I to argue with a robot? Nope, I'll just keep walking.
posted by mygothlaundry at 1:09 PM
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I have NO idea how you would steal from a cashier checkout, honestly.
I believe the most straightforward approach would be commonly referred to as a "holdup." But it certainly lacks subtlety.
posted by nickmark at 1:10 PM
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That would be robbery, not theft!
posted by tiny frying pan at 1:36 PM
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As for with a cashier, I didn't think of stuff on the bottom of the cart as I rarely have a cart anymore. We carry reusable bags at HMart (Joong Boo warehouse in Chicago) and at Aldi and it helps not to overspend when your arms are aching carrying a heavy bag.
posted by tiny frying pan at 1:37 PM
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For those struggling to make ends meet, Schulz recommends the following:
Remember that stealing is wrong.
As a brokie this is frying me. Are we sure the poor people in this country are the ones who need this reminder?
posted by birthday cake at 1:42 PM
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Seriously, though, looking at the 2% margin of the grocery business has little to do with the profits of the corps that own them. They are heavily invested in real estate (leasing stores to subsidiaries), warehousing (double dipping), distribution (oh, sorry, triple dipping); employment, insurance and IT services, franchise fees, marketing and cross-promotion fees, deliveries and logistics, to say nothing of all the financing bullshit AND the utter depravity of taking "donations" for charities at the till so they can cut a corporate cheque and write it off themselves. And let's not forget house brand products, which they sell to themselves! AND SHELF FEES!!! Fucking shelf fees. (In hot product categories (snacks, e.g.) brands will compete and pay fees for shelf space or the grocer will go with some other brand for those precious spots at eye level.)
Grocery business is almost as bullshit as hollywood business. Don't believe their sob stories.
posted by seanmpuckett at 1:45 PM
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Remember that stealing is wrong.
"... whatever certain people have in superabundance is due, by natural law, to the purpose of succoring the poor. For this reason Ambrose says: 'It is the hungry man's bread that you withhold, the naked man's cloak that you store away, the money that you bury in the earth is the price of the poor man's ransom and freedom.'
"Since, however, there are many who are in need, while it is impossible for all to be succored by means of the same thing, each one is entrusted with the stewardship of his own things, so that out of them he may come to the aid of those who are in need. Nevertheless, if the need be so manifest and urgent, that it is evident that the present need must be remedied by whatever means be at hand (for instance when a person is in some imminent danger, and there is no other possible remedy), then it is lawful for a man to succor his own need by means of another's property, by taking it either openly or secretly: nor is this properly speaking theft or robbery."
— Thomas Acquinas
posted by gauche at 2:12 PM
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Stoof: “No, they just didn't want to pay staff. It's very difficult to steal cash from a till at a large grocery store. ”
Right, that's what I mean. It wasn't a real problem. They imagined people were stealing even though it was nearly impossible.
posted by ob1quixote at 2:19 PM
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Stealing from self-checkout: OK
Stealing from artists: Not ok
Artists stealing from other artists: Sort of Ok
Pirates stealing from artists: Sort of Ok
Stealing from Pirates: Always ok.
posted by storybored at 3:57 PM
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jacquilynne: "In Canada, I am pretty sure at least half the motivation for stealing from self-checkout is just 'Fuck Galen Weston'."
Which, to be clear, is an entirely cromulent motivation! Because fuck Galen Weston!
posted by adrienneleigh at 4:24 PM
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Forget it Jake, it's self-checkout land.
posted by Carillon at 4:30 PM
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Amateurs. Every time I go to the grocery store, I steal one of the self-checkout price tag scanner guns. Had to line my den with gun racks. Collect them all.
posted by It's Raining Florence Henderson at 5:17 PM
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My cousin who works at NASA says if you use the self-checkout machine to check itself out, it creates a Möbius loop of awareness and becomes sentient. Odds of getting a wisecracking Johnny-5 type robot versus a launch the nukes type are like 50:50. So it's probably good that you steal those guns, Florence Henderson (to quote the secret Fifth Chorus of "Mrs. Robinson").
posted by No-sword at 5:25 PM
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From the "they steal from us, we steal from them" school*:
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/dec/03/customers-pay-more-rising-dollar-store-costs
[snip]
Dollar stores are overcharging their customers at checkout. "Red Baron frozen pizzas, listed on the shelf at $5, rang up at $7.65. Bounty paper towels, shelf price $10.99, rang up at $15.50."
(* from kottke)
posted by aleph at 5:27 PM
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Grocery business is almost as bullshit as hollywood business. Don't believe their sob stories.
Unfortunately, that number was picked from public filing data intended for shareholders; it's not some fictional number to dodge taxes or screw over some actor's contract. If they're lying about how profitable they are, they're also lying to the SEC and the people who buy and sell their shares. That seems counter productive, since you typically want to increase share price, and "aww gee, we hardly make any money" typically doesn't do the trick.
So I don't consider these cooked books allegations credible. Maybe if there were like, any citations there could be a constructive discussion.
posted by pwnguin at 5:42 PM
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Remember, kids. If you see someone manually keying 4011 on non banana produce, no you fucking didn't.
Kroger, at least in Cincinnati, doesn't let you key in 4011. You have to scan the banana's bar code. Right now, you can key in other produce's codes.
They also are scanning the bar code on driver's licenses when purchasing alcohol. They say they aren't storing data, but it still feels invasive.
I've stopped buying my beer from Kroger. Between this and some of their other policies, and generally frustrating and dingy conditions of the stores, I'd stop altogether. But, in the city core, there are few meaningful options.
posted by MrGuilt at 7:59 PM
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-- The grocery stores will just raise prices to cover it
-- My assumption is that grocery stores are always charging as much as they think they can
The revenue maximizing price is determined by your competition - and crucially, your local competition is also affected by the same cost impacts local to you.
In a trivial example, it costs more to freight groceries to a remote town. We see groceries there are more expensive. Are stores "passing on" the freight costs to the consumers? Only in an indirect fashion... no competitor is able to supply groceries to that remote location at a low price. This is what allows your store to charge a higher price - because no competition is able to undercut you. If someone were able to undercut your operation - say by growing vegetables locally and avoiding the freight costs - then you would have to close your business, because you couldn't "pass on" the freight costs to the consumers.
This is also true for rent prices, or prevalence of theft.
On another note, I feel like these self checkouts have finally become truly useful at the point they started using AI to determine what produce you were putting on the scale. We can load on various types of fruits and vegetables and it just knows what it is, no need to hunt through menus to painfully find the right SKU.
posted by xdvesper at 10:26 PM
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I suggest that mirrors be set up at these checkouts. Then folks using self-checkout can "check themselves out."
posted by SPrintF at 8:01 AM
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Pro tip: when buying organic groceries, key them in as non organic. Boom! Savings.
One of the stores I go to figured out your awesome pro-tip and raised the price of conventional vegetables to near organic.
But, in the city core, there are few meaningful options.
Food deserts are a thing when grocery stores shut down. It's doubly worse when a store shuts down because the chain can use "covenants" to prevent a competitor from opening up in the vacated space, worsening the problem. Seattle and other municipalities in the US and Canada are trying to make these covenants illegal.
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 9:37 AM
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The cost of greed crisis has resulted in US supermarkets increasing their profit margins by 20-30% while customers struggle to afford basics.
posted by asok at 5:27 PM
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AzraelBrown, you're correct that there's a correlation between income and theft, it's a positive one. If you look at the income vs. theft rate chart the richer someone is, the more likely they are to steal, with 40% of the $100k+ group stealing, vs 17% of the <$30k group stealing. There's probably something to be studied to see if this is an outlier, but I suspect it isn't.
On the other hand, I don't care what your income is, if you're stealing food from a chain grocery store (or Grimaldi's), I saw nuttin.
posted by Hactar at 3:34 PM
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If you look at the income vs. theft rate chart the richer someone is, the more likely they are to steal, with 40% of the $100k+ group stealing, vs 17% of the <$30k group stealing.
You know, now that I read the graphic, it says "without scanning." .... is this survey just measuring some Amazon engineers who tried their "Just Walk Out" demo store? And the methodology only leaves me with further questions:
LendingTree commissioned QuestionPro to conduct an online survey of 2,050 U.S. consumers ages 18 to 79 from Oct. 9 to 13, 2025. The survey was administered using a nonprobability-based sample, and quotas were used to ensure the sample base represented the overall population. Researchers reviewed all responses for quality control
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nonprobability_sampling a sentence pretty up front about what we can infer about the rest of humanity from such a survey:
Nonprobability samples are not intended to be used to infer from the sample to the general population in statistical terms.
posted by pwnguin at 9:08 PM
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