Dave Karpf: My local CVS has locked all products behind glass as, I guess, an anti-theft measure. They’ve also severely understaffed the store. So if you want to buy anything, you have to stand in the aisle for 15 minutes, repeatedly pressing an “assistance needed” button. Masterful gambit, CVS. No notes.

My local CVS has locked all products behind glass as, I guess, an anti-theft measure. They’ve also severely understaffed the store. So if you want to buy anything, you have to stand in the aisle for 15 minutes, repeatedly pressing an “assistance needed” button. Masterful gambit, CVS. No notes.

The Shoplifting Myth Is Killing Retail

Turning the “convenience” knob on your convenience store chain further and further down towards zero, looking back at shareholders for approval.

Next step: "For just $29.99 a month, CVS+ customers get priority access to secure materials in all of our stores!"

“Along with AI-based product recommendations!”

(The AI is a Filipino being streamed cctv footage of you in the store)

Curated.

Getting tragedy-then-farce backwards on this one

I do wonder if they're charging brands more to be on the unlocked shelves. I 100% bought deodorant because it was the kind not behind glass

*Retinal scan required

Fast Pass at the self check out line

I suspect things will return to how it was decades and decades ago, when people would hand in a list of products to the cashier, who would then grab it for you.

Except it'll all just be done online and with AI and touchscreens and a single worker sending products down a dumbwaiter so people'll think it's all done by robots or something.

Upper management sabotage so they can close the store and sell the real estate but blame poor sales or lack of foot traffic for the closure.

Right. There was an infamous one in DC like this that was circling the drain long before Covid and the "crime wave". It was an excuse to put a clearly disliked store out of its misery.

Do you recall which one?

Tenleytown Target?

Probably that one. I recall Skanky Safeway on Georgia, but they replaced that with a whole complex AND a new store.

tj maxx: hold my beer

TJ Maxx store workers now wearing body cameras to thwart shoplifterswww.cbsnews.com A growing number of retailers are considering equipping security and other employees with body cams in a bid to deter thefts.

The difference between this and cops? If a TJ Maxx employee turns off their body cam, they get fired.

And if a cop turns on their body cam, they get fired. Or drummed out of their job by the Union, for not being a team player.

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I used to try to buy things at my local stores but screw it: if they make it impossible I'm going online.

That's the point

I understand the pressures they’re responding to, but it’s a viscous spiral: they are removing the tactile experience which is (almost) the only edge brick-and-mortar has over e-commerce. I can’t wait for clothing stores to eliminate dressing rooms “for security reasons”.

I’m just going to accept that my phone recognizes I type “viscous” more than “vicious”. Loud and proud.

I mean, both work. It is a thick and sticky mess of a cycle, making it slower and harder to get through a shopping trip because the innocent shoppers are caught up in the nonsense. Plus it's spitefully cruel to entire neighborhoods without many alternatives.

A store near me lost a dozen widescreen TVs, and reported them stolen. The staff were interrogated to find out who'd been involved in the theft. The manager then found that the shipment had been stored in the wrong place in the warehouse. The delivery had been signed for by... the manager.

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I honestly assume that the supposed rash of store theft is a media play by Amazon because CVS’s response pushes me to order everything I used to buy at CVS from Amazon.

My favorite part is the coupon scheme that ties up the one cashier for 20 minutes per customer as people walk out. Great job CVS management!!

Meanwhile this shitty chain is becoming an essential cog in our healthcare delivery system

stealing your time, stealing from the should-be staffers time, and charging you for the privilege of the theft. this was a good read itself.blog/2024/06/15/w...

What is the economy even for?itself.blog In my household, I am in charge of keeping us stocked with cleaning products and shared toiletries. For many years, this has been remarkably easy, because there is a CVS Pharmacy two blocks from our h...

Maybe it’s like Tesla sales rooms where you look over the product in person then order online?

CVS is on this self defeating spiral lately

The good news : with less sales, think of the acres of forests to be saved by printing less CVS receipts.

It feels so short sighted there has to be corruption behind it or maybe its classic management consultant genius? Or maybe they really don’t care bc the pharmacy is the only section that makes money? It’s bewildering.

Possibly related - several times recently when I tried to visit our small-town CVS, it has been shut due to "understaffing" (according to the notice on the door). Yet I haven't seen a single want ad looking for more staff.

Wal-Mart did this in a town close by. But only for certain things, underwear, socks, make-up, tools. Then if you buy say socks after waiting for one to ten minutes. They don't give you the product they take it up front and you have to ask for it a.second time taking up more time.

Reminds me of this classic Gary Larson Far Side comic static0.srcdn.com/wordpress/wp...

I call that "shopper repellent"

This after buying up Rite Aid just to close all their locations so there’s no other pharmacy within 20 minutes…

That's a Walgreens but yes. I know because really the only pharmacy in my town is a Rite Aid that's closing and locals will now have to drive 20-30 miles to the closest Walgreens.

But they've created a lot of value for shareholders!

Yeah, but what are you going to do, leave and go to a Walgreens? It's not like they build them next to each other.

CVS stock keeps on falling because they're ruining their business by cutting staff in an effort to boost their stock prices.

CVS is DC was always a 💩 🔥

The good news is that shoplifting rates will drop

Can't get shoplifted if no one comes to your store anymore.

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There's always a bad news dude to the coin

Side. WTF with the autocorrect?

Shoplifters will just go somewhere else along with everyone else…. OH……

“Shop online and pay the delivery fee or you won’t get shit from us”

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