I frequently drive past a retail site from my childhood that was once a store called “Service Merchandise”. It had an odd concept where every item was on display and you pulled a tag (like how you bought a video game at Toys R Us back in the 1980s and 1990s). You would take this tag to the register, pay, and then go stand at a conveyer belt where your items came out (like getting luggage at the airport if memory serves). What was the perceived benefit of organizing a store this way? Were there other “catalog stores” (a term my mother uses to refer to Service Merchandise when I ask about it) or was this unique to Service Merchandise?
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Pros: Customers don’t handle the merchandise until point of sale, which reduces theft and is convenient for large items that a customer can’t/won’t lug around the store (like a dishwasher or a microwave)
Cons: Very inefficient and requires a lot of staff if customers purchase many small items, as a lot of time/energy is needed to pick them.
Oddly enough, for most of human history most stores worked in this method. You would go to a grocery store and give the clerk a list. They would have someone go in the back and pick your items for you. The first “self service” grocery store was Piggly Wiggly, which opened in 1916.
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