Drive-Thru Supermarkets
It was only a short while ago that I mentioned in an article that you can get more fitness into your life by simply parking your car further away from the entrance of your supermarket. The latest invention in grocery shopping takes the opposite direction.
Hail Convenience!
It goes as follows: You visit your supermarket’s website, choose the groceries you want to buy and set the time you want to drive over. When you arrive, everything will already have been put into bags and ready to be stored in your trunk. Payment was either already sent when you finished your order online or you do it on pick-up, from your driver’s window.
The whole concept was brought to life already two years ago, when retail giant Sears opened a first test location of this kind under the moniker “mygofer”. Last year they expanded it to most of the continental US, after which the British Tesco and German Metro groups copied it for their homes countries.
For those content with pre-packaged food, at least examining and choosing it so far seemed the most elemental interest they can have in something they, after all, put into their bodies.
Or do people really care that little about what they eat, that they don’t even want to eye which one of the plastic-wrapped 8 oz steaks ends up in their bag? Or how many days that gallon of milk still has to go before its “best before date” comes by?
And on the other end we have the group of consumers that embraces organic foods, doesn’t see a problem with visiting a farmer’s market and even pay higher prices there.
It seems that we consumers, as a whole, are developing schizophrenia.
Picture courtesy of “Plume Noir“.
20 Comments
picture…
I am a morally outraged at that picture evil >.> I thought this was a Christian blog with Christian values. I was mistaken. I’m going to take my godless heathen-ness elsewhere
But serious, shop-rite delivers to people’s houses around here if I remember right… So I think we win. Sit at home, click a couple times, have chrome autofill do the delivery info, and sit around. You don’t even have to talk or leave the house.
Maybe I’m a bit naive, but I think there’s hardly a thing in the world that could outrage you, Moon 😉
I think the word “schizophrenia” is too light to describe this. I’m really worried about the next generations…
And Evil, you could’ve put a better looking girl 😀
Actually I think she is attractive, in a, well, disturbing way 😉
In the UK you can have tesco deliver it to your door, you do it all online. No one else have that?
That’s around here, too. But with the erratic daily schedules some people have apparently doesn’t work as well as this new concept of “drive-thru supermarkets”.
Some in Canada. Delivery to your door. heck you can have it set-up as a weekly thing to get the same thing delivered even if you do not need it.
I kinda like the girl tbh.
But yeah fortunately there’s nothing like that in Finland. And it’s also prett rare to go to a supermarket with a car. Or even go to a supermarket. Groceries are mainly done in bit smaller shops that are located where people actually live.
I can remember the times when it used to be like this around here. And I wonder if things weren’t better then. How much choice in breakfast cereal does one truly need?
@juh Yeah, when I was in Finland we got most of our food from small shops, at least our fruits and breads came from shops and vendors. We went to some supermarket type thing for groceries though. Waay different than here in the US. The way stores are set up and all. A lot less refined goodies in Finland hahaha (although the candy isles were huge :P)
I think there are some cultural differences here as well. In the US people like to get all their groceries for an entire week with one ride to the supermarket, where, for example, the French often make small purchases daily, after work.
Goddamn candy aisles. And the fact that they’re just in fron of the check-in makes it even worse. The tobacco law in finland will change so that no tobacco can be visible in a few years time. I’d prefer if it was that way with candy as well 😛
Yeah we got the delivery to your door in Sweden as well.
I wouldn’t say consumers are schizophrenic, I’d say it’s the people who realize the dangers of obesity, and those who don’t care. Those who don’t want to pay a fee for some small thing like going to the store and those who want to save time/don’t care about the fee.
I see how it’s a useful tool for those with very little time, but many who’ll use it will just be too damn lazy.
However, I think in way that is getting the priorities messed up. If our jobs are more important than our well-being, why do we try to advance our careers?
POWAAHHHHH!!!!!
Well it is for me. Can’t rule the world on a fast food salary. 😛
Interestingly, fast food is quite expensive here in Germany. A Big Mac at McDonald’s costs €3.29 – about $4.39.
3.75 in Finland. But as a whole eating outside is waaaay cheaper in Germany when compared to Finland. Falafel and such cost over 6€ (unless the business is somewhat illegal)
Illegal? I wouldn’t really want to find out what meat that might be then 😉
Whoa, that’s interesting! And so many people think that “fast food” = “cheap food”. Well, “cheap” maybe in another sense.