Bill Packard: 14 items

Thu, 02/23/2017 - 10:00am

Well, football season is over and what a win for the Patriots! Now that the excitement from that is over, we're still in the throes of winter, but thankfully there's NASCAR. The Daytona 500 kicks off the season and I'm looking forward to it. I'm a big NASCAR fan (judge me if you must) and have always felt we can learn a lot from that sport. I even have a video on my YouTube channel that talks about how small businesses can learn some lessons from NASCAR.

I think there is a great opportunity for grocery stores to follow the example of NASCAR and make things better for their customers. A little background. I do the usual grocery shopping. From time to time Kathy and Tera go unannounced to some exotic location and come back with big packages of toilet paper, paper towels, family size chicken, ribs and other meats. I have no idea where they go or what's involved. All I know is that it's an all-day project for them that goes deep into the night and I have a car full to unload when they return way after dark. That's not the grocery shopping I'm talking about. My kind of shopping is not as much shopping as it is buying. It takes a very short time to go in, pick up what I want and check out. No overflowing cart, just what we need, and that's where NASCAR comes in.

I do most of my shopping at Hannaford on Maverick Street in Rockand. Sometimes it's The Common Market in Union. That store is super, but I have to drive by the house to get there, and that's really troubling for me, so more often than not, it's Hannaford. My NASCAR idea wouldn't work at Gary's anyway because of the setup, but I'm really hoping Hannaford runs with this and implements it to coincide with the beginning of the season.

When I'm buying, I rarely exceed the 14 items or less purchase so I go to those checkouts. A couple of times I've mentioned that the 30 pack of beer put me over the limit, just trying to be funny, but the checkout folks don't find that funny. They just tell me that I'm fine. It's the same reaction when they ask me if I found everything OK and I ask them if they hid stuff. Not everyone sticks to the 14 items or less rule. I think I have a solution for that.

In NASCAR, certain violations require the offender to go to the end of the longest line on the restart. That's what I think should happen at the grocery store. Here's how it would work. Every time they scan an item, there's a beep. When I'm in line at the 14 items or less line, I count the beeps of the people in front of me. It's my way of judging what kind of a person they are. A 15 or 16 beep person gets the benefit of the doubt. Yes, they could be stretching the rules, but it's not blatant and maybe they lost count of things that were buried in the cart. The 24 to 30 people, I don't think much of them. Yes. It's possible that they use common core math, but I think it's more likely that they only think about themselves and don't care one single bit for the people behind them in the line. Under my plan, here's what would happen. When the beeper beeps for the 15th time, the light starts flashing red at the checkout and a siren goes off along with a loud announcement something like, "Item violation in aisle 3. Item violation in aisle 3." At that point available baggers would grab the offender's groceries and whisk them and the offender out of the line. The checkout supervisor would show up and take control and determine the longest checkout line. There would be no appeal process. The offender and their groceries would be placed in that line.

Here's the beauty of this plan. Only the offender is inconvenienced. Everyone else benefits. The way it works now, the offender is not inconvenienced, but everyone else is. Every time the 14 items or less aisle reaches that limit, someone is checking out or starting over. It's really pretty simple. In fact, I'm surprised nobody has thought of this before.

Yes. You're right. It's genius. I do what I can. Drivers, shoppers, start your engines!


Bill PackardBill Packard lives in Union and is the founder of BPackard.com. He is a speaker, author, small business coach and consultant.

More Bill Packard

Hold my beer and watch this!
Adulting
Trying to get organized, I become disorganized
How not to break into a safe
Blue Colony
Summer in Maine
Parker loved a good time
The Moving Wall and the Vietnam era
Done? No. Just getting started again
The finer points of occupying a public space (Tip: Bring snacks)
The Zumwalt: Built in Maine
Mainers and their most happily miserable Thanksgiving
Sam, I'll miss your smile
Troubles with the fridge
Where the weirdness comes in
Boycotting the Oreo and why I won't
Parenting can be tough, it you work at it too much
Choose wisely, graduates
Beware the June 30 leap second
Don't get too stuck on yourself, or what you offer
WRKD's Easter Egg hunt in Camden — back in the day
On being serious
Don't wish them dead. Vote them out of office
Think twice before you sue
An Act to Increase the Effectiveness of the Legislature
Driving trucks in the Blizzard of '78
I am not making this stuff up
Don't buy into the stress of the holidays
Lighten Up

A troubling election season
Laundry time
Midcoast is where we live, charity is what it's all about

Jim Laurita was a doer, not just a talker
Miracles
Minimum wage and personal responsibility

Pause before criticizing first responders
About the movers and shakers
Tactical Urbanism in Camden
Break the rules now and then

Studying
With Rockport Fire Chief Bruce Woodward and the Learning Chair
About Elimination Communication

I didn't intend to offend any mothers. Obviously, I did
At Union’s Applewood Farm, a lesson in listening
Let's go to court instead
Plowing

People having fun is a good thing
Out of the box and into the zone
Making things personal and individual
Letting go of the old clock
A friend of God on Faccebook

It’s a different life out on the road
If your school got a C or a D or, God forbid, an F, get over it

Tell your dad how much he means to you
Event planning, corn boil picnic and buses
Life goes on, but a piece of the community goes away

Talk of weather brings up another aspect of Maine living... suffering
Guilt is a useless emotion
What's with all this greening of Camden?
About reinventing ourselves
Intolerance
Say what?
Need a little help finding the value of x
I guess I feel guilty
Video does not represent Maine lobster industry
Every Saturday should be 'Shop Local Saturday,' whatever that is
I don't get it

SpongeBob, cops and the use of allegedly
The stupid things big business does

Legislature could vote it made a mistake about school union mergers
Just let go
Traveling with the Trekkers
Here's why I like plowing
Bath Iron Works builds best ships in the world
Aboard the USS Zumwalt in Bath

Working for Snapper at Marriners’
Doing better than the bare minimum
Thinking about obituaries
Women are from Venus, but most men are from down the street somewhere