Practices for Improving Queue Length in Retail Stores

When the trucks arrive a small team unloads and bring product to their designated section of the store. For apparel, the clothing is put on racks and wheeled out. Where a small team folds, locates and displays them according to planograms and sets. The process of unloading, locating, displaying should be concluded before the store opens with no products on the sales floor. This is to keep the store looking clean and providing the customers with a clean, stocked environment. The effectiveness of Targets current distribution is good; however, inventory counts often have a crippling effect on the company. Since target launched their online pickup and ship from store the company has noticed an error in their operations. Their inventory counts did not refresh fast enough, if a guest just bought say a dress, it would not be accounted for, for 3-5 hours later in the system. Thus, issues for customer satisfaction would occur when a guest would either see online that we had it in stock, or order it for in store pick up and us not being able to fulfill their order. By improving their inventory management system, Target could see an increase in sales, customer satisfaction and online and in store customer traffic.

We know that the order entry system is working poorly because the cycle time exceeds the customer timeline, but

Long-term, the cart also can be part of an expedited check out system that decreases congestion during the check out process (Media Cart, 2010). Consumers scan items as they put them into their carts and directly into bags. At the end of their shopping experience, they move the cart onto the scale to check for accuracy and for additional items, before they pay and leave; this process could save money by reducing customer service personnel.

A store like Nordstrom has built a successful model on availability of knowledgeable salespeople, and other luxury or near-luxury retailers would be advised to pay attention. But a mass retailer like Target is not dependent on “high touch” customer service; rather, the most important things it can do to satisfy its shoppers are to ensure that goods are on the shelf and the checkout process is efficient. As more consumers migrate to

There are plenty of ways to reduce wait time its just the way people manage it. One way I can suggest to reduce wait time would be to bring back roller skates. If you ever go to sonic to eat you will see that skates aren’t used to take out orders. Skating is proven to be faster than walking as long as you know how to skate but even if you don’t know how to skate there should be some kind of training to teach you how to skate. Another way to reduce wait time would be to eliminate bad employees. You can’t expect to reduce wait time if you have lazy employees, you need people who want to improve in their work area. For example, I work at sonic and I have witnessed lazy employees in the present and past, and they bring up our times which make us look bad. Eliminating bad employees could solve a lot of problems with reducing wait time. Why should somebody be getting paid for doing nothing? Well I don’t agree that they should, therefore if we can avoid hiring them in the first place we wouldn’t have to go out of our way trying to eliminate

Many businesses are implementing technology to combat wage increases and remain competitive. Many larger retailers, such as Walmart and Kroger, have effectively maintained self-checkouts for customers for years. The self-checkout area may have four to six registers, manned by one associate. Larger gas stations are implementing new technologies, as well. Quick Trip(QT) has installed a system that allows the user to order food and drink by touch screen, print a ticket and pay at the regular counter, eliminating the need for extra cashiers and registers. They serve a variety of items such as specialty coffees, smoothies, pretzels, pizza, sandwiches, ice cream and more with their user-friendly system. In addition, pay at the pump has provided relief at long lines of gas stations for years. Restaurants such as Wendy’s, McDonalds, and Panera bread are currently investing in kiosk to serve the future needs of their customers. Wendy’s will have 6,000 locations equipped with kiosk by the end of 2016. "With the pressure on wages and minimum wage increasing in some places, (restaurants) are motivated," said Bob Welcher, president of Restaurant Consultants Inc. "From an operational standpoint, I can see the advantages." Welcher also adds that “The kiosks are more precise. They always are courteous. They always show up to work on time." (Malone, JD. "Wendy's embraces self-order kiosks." Columbus Dispatch, The (OH) 17 May 2016: Newspaper Source. Web. 9 Dec. 2016.)

Lower the risk of employees mis-ringing items, for example, just to complete the transaction and keep customers from waiting.

The other option of payment that ASDA has was customer can choose to use self- scan checkouts machine, which is customer require to scan the barcode themselves, input the types of items, weight them and place all scanned items into a “bagging area”. The weight observed in the bagging area is verified against previous stored information to ensure that customer put the correct item in bag, and allowing customer to proceed only if the observed and expected weights match. In some cases the shoppers are trying to purchase an item through self- scan tills, and does not scan the item, and directly put the item in bagging area, the system will not be proceed. And the error message of “please contact staff” will appear.

I believe the followings are the factors that helped them to have such an effective line system. The store dedicated close to 32 cash registrars and 25 of them are for customers who shops fewer than five items during peak or lunch time and located close to the various food stands are displayed arranged in five rows . Seven of the cash counters are located on the

For instance, over a period of time the inter-arrival rates had a consistent trend overall but the service times for each customer did not follow the same consistency. The data collected showed transactions involving returns occupied more time, usually in the range of 1.5 to 2 minutes and sometimes more. Transactions that were less than 1.5 to 2 minutes were purchases-only. The environment of the checkout area was taken into consideration. The setup of products in the designated waiting area is a positive way to distract customers from actual waiting time. This arrangement also maximizes store profits as patrons are tempted to make impulse purchases. This was the immediate inherent explanation as to why only one check-out/returns line is used. Although there is a designated waiting area, if service times are slower than the arrival rate, the queue extends past the designated waiting line and blocks merchandise intended to be viewed by customers not in the queue. Blocking off merchandise and the visual image of a line extending past the designated area negatively impact the experience of a customer and the decision to wait in line. The loss of a customer is associated with a cost to Winners. Therefore, for every customer that leaves the system before they have been serviced represents a cost to store management in addition to operating and waiting costs. For this report, only the

The immediate benefits of this product are apparent this business idea has the potential to alleviate the long lines at grocery stores and significantly cut down on the amount of employees that these stores need to hire. This could have positive effects on the efficiency of the grocery stores that choose to use this tech.

Self-serve checks out are becoming more and more popular especially in grocery stores. Main advantage of installing self-checkout is that customer with a few items has not need to wait in a long queues. From organization perspective, it involves one lump sum investment in buying

Technological environment shows that there is more Point of Sales systems available with electronic shelf labels and scanner. In addition, self-checkout registers and advertising through mobile apps are getting more common.

This new system will allow customers to input their own orders allowing staff to focus on preparing orders. With the new system, it will eliminate pressure as a result of preventing you from being overwhelmed with complaints about wait times or lengthy lines. There will be no waiting for customers to decide what they want to order or others complaining about them taking too long to place an order. The plan is to put the system into operation within the

Barringer will be used as a guide in providing a comprehensive assessment. In examining the competitive landscape of smartphone applications enabling consumers to scan and purchase grocery items, currently there are no competitors. There are store provided hand-held scanning devices in which items are scanned and downloaded at the checkout terminal.