“Shopping really was a delightful thing, a special thing that you got to do,” says market researcher Pamela Danziger, whose work focuses on the behaviors of affluent consumers in particular. These retail spaces not only had sales floors, but also gardens, tea rooms, and full-service restaurants. The early department stores that popped up in the late 1800s and early 1900s were an elegant, even opulent innovation that centralized consumers’ shopping needs their beautifully decorated windows drew in passersby, and the stores themselves were massive and filled with a vast range of goods, with knowledgeable, attentive staff ready to aid customers. Yet the through line of why shopping from beyond the comfort of your home feels so miserable now has less to do with the pandemic’s disruption and everything to do with retailers unable - or unwilling - to invest in stores, including the labor that makes a shopping trip go smoothly or not.ĭespite what companies may want you to think, nearly every issue you encounter while shopping is a result of bad working conditions for retail employees. Understaffing, inventory problems, and heavy-handed theft prevention measures are hardly new to the retail industry, but the problems have become more commonplace in the last few years, when the dial of frustration and discomfort turned higher. To shop in a store these days, she laments, “You have to budget a lot of time.”Ī Target spokesperson declined to comment on whether it locked up baby formula, writing in an emailed statement, “On a limited basis, we employ theft-deterrent merchandising strategies, such as locking cases, for categories that are prone to theft.” ![]() She sees lines of people waiting for the product they want to be unlocked. A couple of months ago, the Target she frequents started locking up formula, and there seemed to be fewer employees around to help her get it, with “much more emphasis on trying to funnel people to self-checkout,” she says. While the worst of the baby formula shortage has ebbed, sometimes Leibson still needs to visit a few stores in the Bay Area to find it. But the 29-year-old wasn’t able to avoid it after she had a baby and needed formula, she says. Hayley Leibson avoids in-store shopping whenever possible. Equally aggravating: empty shelves, or only a register or two open at any given time. Vox spoke with customers across the country who bemoaned a dearth of employees in stores of all stripes. Now going to the store, whether it’s a Macy’s in a suburban mall or the neighborhood CVS - basically, all but the most luxury of retailers - is a battle that leaves consumers feeling defeated. It was both a social and languid activity, an opportunity to connect with a friend or explore our materialistic desires in contented solitude. We also offer a Wedding & Gift Registry available in all stores and on our website.Whether it was spritzing on perfumes in a department store or fantasizing about a more organized home in the seemingly endless aisles of Bed Bath & Beyond, shopping was once a far more pleasurable experience than it is today. Our website offers many of the items found in our stores as well as many that aren’t. Our knowledgeable sales associates are eager to help adding an element of customer service that our customers have come to expect. We believe in an every day low price policy that allows our customers to buy with confidence. Walk through our stores and you never know what you’ll find… everything from “gotta have” items that serve every basic need to “ah-ha” products that solve common household quandaries to new and unique items that just hit our shelves. Our knowledgeable sales associates are eager to help adding an element of customer - more. ![]() Products: Walk through our stores and you never know what you’ll find… everything from “gotta have” items that serve every basic need to “ah-ha” products that solve common household quandaries to new and unique items that just hit our shelves.
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