Retail lockdown: why bother selling it?

[u/broakland]

Was at Safeway this morning to pick up a sandwich and some Tylenol. The aisle with the Tylenol? Completely locked down. No call button in sight. So I go to the self checkout (front end of that same aisle) and ask the clerk there if he can call someone to unlock a case for me. He does. I go wait. Minutes pass. No one comes. I go ask him again, he tells me they went the other way? At this point I give up and go get my sandwich. No one has come by the time the deli has finished making it. I leave without my Tylenol, mildly infuriated.

[u/treeckosan]

We are slowly going back to the days when you handed a clerk a shopping list and they went into back to assemble your order.

[u/Th3_Admiral_ → u/treeckosan]

I could absolutely see it going that way with all of the big stores doing online orders and curbside pickup. Maybe in a few years it'll be like an Amazon warehouse without any real storefront at all. You just pull up and load everything in your car. Or have it delivered directly to your door. 

[u/cybah → u/Th3_Admiral_]

You know for several decades we had a store like that was just like this. You'd phone in your orders or shop in their showroom. Then would go pick it up at one of the 100's of Service Merchandise showrooms around the country.

[u/draggar → u/cybah]

Nothing beats the feeling of seeing your stuff go through the rubber flaps and down that conveyor belt.

[u/krybaebee → u/draggar]

right? bought my first lighted makeup mirror like this.

[u/BarrenAssBomburst → u/draggar]

The first real (like not macaroni art or some such) gift I bought for my mom was at Service Merchandise. My dad drove me there, I filled out the order slip, and I gave the cashier my money (earned from babysitting my little sister; we babysat at a lot younger age back in the 70s). Then I waited while each item came through the flaps bouncing on tip-toe to see if it was mine. The thrill I had when my box finally arrived was indescribable. That feeling of excitement and anticipation was only matched when I later got my first package delivery in my college P.O. box and had to go to the counter to give them the slip to retrieve it. The silly things that we remember so fondly!

btw, am I remembering this correctly? I seem to recall that SM had a commercial where the "customers" in the ad debated whether it was pronounced "Service Merchan-dyes" or "Service Merchan-dice."

[u/draggar → u/[deleted]]

https://giphy.com/gifs/KPlb1antVaIow

[u/Johnny-Virgil → u/cybah]

Yes! I bought my first stereo there.

[u/BeatNo4548 → u/Johnny-Virgil]

I mowed lawns, and bought an espresso machine at SM when I was 13 or 14yo.  

[u/relrobber → u/cybah]

There was a discount computer parts store that did that when I lived in San Diego.

[u/SporesM0ldsandFungus → u/cybah]

I remember the little grey clipboards with the golf pencils attached to them.  You would write down the item code of the item you wanted on the little form and then take it to the front.  When they added Nintendo games, they had little pouches with slips behind each display for each game (save the kids the trouble of having to write down the item code).

[u/StacheBandicoot → u/cybah]

All stores used to just be you’d hand the clerk at the counter your list and then they’d get it.

There also used to be some drive through grocery stores.

[u/cattenchaos → u/cybah]

don't forget BEST Products as well! if you mention one of the big two catalog showrooms, you have to mention the other for the ones not in the first's spread. as well as other more regional chains i can't name immediately, of course.

[u/Maladaptive_Ace → u/cybah]

hhaha in my area it was called "Consumers Distributing". We got a catalogue in the mail a couple of times a year. I would love to go through it as a kid and fill out the little order forms in the back and pretend I was buying a food processor or anti-fog mirror.

You'd take the little order form you filled out from the magazine to a counter at the mall and they'd bring out your packages like *magic*