Retail Collapse 2019: Bezos realized that marriage is a form of union

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > Retail Collapse 2019: Bezos realized that marriage is a form of union

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OneEightHundred: Feb 28, 2008; Soon, we will be unstoppable!

I'm having a hard time even thinking of a case where there was a sale of a major Japanese game IP to a foreign publisher.

# ¿ Nov 2, 2020 08:32

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# ¿ May 12, 2024 04:31

OneEightHundred: Feb 28, 2008; Soon, we will be unstoppable!

Quality control is the other shoe that drops after disintermediation every loving time. Except for Uber, where the other shoe is oops, you destroyed your car.

# ¿ Nov 7, 2020 00:33

OneEightHundred: Feb 28, 2008; Soon, we will be unstoppable!

Fork of Unknown Origins posted:

Tellingly, there�s no real reason for �product that expired so we threw it away� and �stolen product� to be lumped into one category.

Sometimes it isn't, some retailers don't consider spoilage (or other in-store damage) to be shrink if the item is recorded as damaged, and only consider unaccounted-for product loss to be shrink. But even then, it does make sense, because spoilage is something that they do have some control over (e.g. by putting older product in front of fresher product to get it off the shelf).

BougieBitch posted:

To some degree I'm sure that consumer electronics or cosmetics make for more attractive targets if you care about the dollar value of what you shoplift over its personal utility, but it seems like pretty mediocre value to try to profit that way - congrats, you now have similar earning potential to a Mary Kay salesperson.

This might be a pedantic derail but part of MLM scams like Mary Kay is that the wholesale prices are inflated and the margins are poo poo. If the margins were actually good then they wouldn't be emphasizing the pyramid scheme part as the way to making money from it.

# ¿ Oct 23, 2023 04:00

OneEightHundred: Feb 28, 2008; Soon, we will be unstoppable!

BougieBitch posted:

It's easy to see how the media benefits from being sensational about "audacious retail theft" or whatever, because if you describe it like a bank robbery then you can turn a topic that has basically no legs as a story into something that people actually read.

Well, the "audacious" part really shows how much of this is the tail wagging the dog. Lots of videos playing of intense, damaging smash-and-grabs when the reality of organized retail theft is that they do things specifically to AVOID drawing attention, like having people assigned to distract staff away from the area being looted.

Meanwhile things like dudes walking into a store, shoveling a bunch of stuff in a bag, and leaving while security does nothing has actually been going on for ages, it just wasn't considered newsworthy until it started being useful for boosting a "shoplifting epidemic" narrative.

BougieBitch posted:

Ultimately, someone trying to do this as a career is very likely to end up in the exact same position as a person who falls for the Mary Kay scam - they have a bunch of makeup they have to sell and no one they can sell it to.

Not exactly because the margin on stolen goods is 100%. Resale can only make money on margins. Doing that as an independent seller of legit products is already hard because of FBA competition. Doing it with MLM poo poo is even harder because their wholesale prices are inflated relative to the prices that they can be reasonably sold at (i.e. because they're poo poo products with no marketing and tons of other marks desperately trying to get rid of them).

quote:

if this was really such a common thing you would have a bunch of similar people across the country undercutting each other into oblivion anyway

Stolen goods don't really drive price wars because they're a small part of the overall supply, and also sold on less-convenient channels.

However, the channels they are sold on are still massively better for thieves than the prior alternatives of offloading them at pawn shops and flea markets, which is part of the problem.

# ¿ Oct 23, 2023 05:03

OneEightHundred: Feb 28, 2008; Soon, we will be unstoppable!

Semi-interesting development, I can't find a news link that doesn't look like some regurgitator website, but Target is rolling out a 10-item limit at self-checkout at a bunch of locations.

# ¿ Oct 26, 2023 04:52

OneEightHundred: Feb 28, 2008; Soon, we will be unstoppable!

Discendo Vox posted:

appears to be motivated by congestion during high traffic periods.

Wonder how much the appearance of congestion (vs. actual congestion) has to do with it.

The single self-checkout area setup causes long lines when it gets backed up (even though the lines are relatively fast-moving), and it's positioned in a way that it usually loops around the racetrack right in front of the entrance, which is a great recipe for getting customers walking in to turn around and leave.

# ¿ Oct 26, 2023 06:26

OneEightHundred: Feb 28, 2008; Soon, we will be unstoppable!

Jaxyon posted:

So I was just at Best Buy to replace a TV, and holy poo poo they have cut staffing to the bone. There was maybe 3 blue shirts in the entire place, at a very busy Los Angeles location. I had to wait at least 20 minutes to buy a product I knew 100% I wanted and just needed them to go grab for me. There was at least 2 other customers near me and we all just kinda stared at each other.

They pretty much expect you to order everything online and pick it up at the counter now, and not much point in maintaining a "high-service" environment when a huge TV is down to a couple hundred bucks.

# ¿ Oct 26, 2023 20:18

OneEightHundred: Feb 28, 2008; Soon, we will be unstoppable!

PitViper posted:

I don't understand why they waste the huge space with checkouts that are never used.

I just assume they were just built prior to the move to self-checkout and never removed for whatever reason. Maybe they don't want to get rid of them in case they need them again, and it's not like there's a lot of through traffic through that area so it's not a good place to be selling merchandise out of.

I've seen some Targets where the section where there could be more checkout lanes has merchandise instead and it's always full of junk like snacks and gift card racks.

# ¿ Nov 12, 2023 18:57

OneEightHundred: Feb 28, 2008; Soon, we will be unstoppable!

Most grocers also have a scheme where staple/popular goods are constantly on sale, so while it is partly a psychological thing to make people think they have to act now even though the thing is never actually going off of sale, the other purpose is to just penalize people that don't have the store loyalty card.

OneEightHundred fucked around with this message at 02:36 on Dec 27, 2023

# ¿ Dec 27, 2023 02:31

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# ¿ May 12, 2024 04:31

OneEightHundred: Feb 28, 2008; Soon, we will be unstoppable!

Department stores have been running that scam for ages, like if I want to buy pants at Kohls, the "regular price" doesn't exist. They're always on sale, it's just a different sale every week.

I think New York State has or used to have a fun law making minimum quantity type sales illegal, so if you saw "buy one get one free" and you bought one then it'd be 50% off.

# ¿ Dec 27, 2023 03:08

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > Retail Collapse 2019: Bezos realized that marriage is a form of union

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