The Reality of Working for a Supermarket in 2009/Return to Victorian Britain

bendix

chopperharris wrote: »

For decades there has been warnings of the supermarket killing the high street , we never listened.They destroyed the high street shop , now they are into banking.

We buy their wares , mostly imported , at the cost of british manufacturing and farming.Your old british brands are being made overseas yet you dont know and continue buying them.

They appear to be rivals , well what supermarket chains are left , while colluding on price fixing.

Read a book called fast food nation , you can apply it rather well to supermarkets not just fast food...they use the same practices for procurement.

Councils can no longer afford to fight the planning process of a new supermarket being built.SO they just dont bother as its more cost affective.

But hey every little helps.

What's your point? Do you shop in supermarkets, and if so why? Low prices? Convenience? Would you prefer to revert to the system 40 years ago when shopping meant going from the butcher to the baker to the cheese shop to the fishmonger etc?

Or - on balance - do you get a much better, cheaper shopping service in today's environment.

The system is at it is ONLY because that is what we - the shoppers - want. Attacking them for giving us what we want seems rather silly.

bendix

And how have supermarkets killed the highstreet? That is palpable nonsense. They have CHANGED the highstreet, and the last time I walked down my high street I saw a wide range of shops including (from memory) a supermarket and a supermarket metro store, numerous newsagencies, two bakers, a fish shop, a variety of clothes stores, several coffee shops and restaurants, two household goods stores (independent), a whole line of fruit and vegetable sellers on stalls, several specialist snack retailers like cinnabon etc, a record store, a bookshop, two florists, a greeting card store etc etc. Oh, and a post office and the usual run of banks and building societies.

If that is a high street that has been killed, then I'm a banana.

Curiously everything that could be bought in the small stores is pretty much available in the supermarket too, and yet the two exist side by side, each offering something different to shoppers with different needs and wants.

abaxas

What gets me is the style of people who shop at different supermarkets.

Where we live there is an Aldi, Waitrose and a Tesco.

If your middle class you shop at Aldi, if your a new money middle class you shop at Waitrose and if you are some kind of genetic mutant you shop at Tesco.

It's amazing how people can be conned by marketing such as 'discount brands'.

doire_2

I read that Gordon Brown is going to give temp workers the same right as permanent staff. What does this acutally mean?

In Spain for example, if after two years you are still a temp worker the company you work for has to make you permanent

abaxas

doire wrote: »

I read that Gordon Brown is going to give temp workers the same right as permanent staff. What does this acutally mean?

In Spain for example, if after two years you are still a temp worker the company you work for has to make you permanent

I means that all temp workers will become self employed and will earn less thwn minimum wage.

kennyboy66_2

tesuhoha wrote: »

I dont know. I only know they work it out by how much they 'pick'/load per hour.

In a previous life I was an accountant for one of the logistics companies who run large distribution centres (RDC's) for the supermarkets.

Typically a supermarket will employ Wincanton, Excel, TDG etc to run these sites for a small management fee often on an open book basis (all costs disclosed and passed on to client). The main controllable variable in these sites is labour, and the logistics companies will bid and generally promise a "case pick" rate. Naturally they over bid and the pressure feeds on to the guys who have to do the picking.
Some of the labour will be directly employed, topped up by say 15% agency labour.
If you can improve the case pick rate from 100 per hour to 120 per hour the savings are significant.

Its the agencies guys who get the short end of the stick - often they are bussed in from miles away (RDC's are often in places of low unemployment) and for Xmas they often come from say Portugal to work (Sept - Jan).

As an aside, often at Xmas uk citizens will be taken on from Sept - Dec, frequently they have no desire to work extra shifts / more than 3 days a week, because of various benefit issues / child maintenance. Hence despite having to pay agencies to get foriegn staff over and accomodate them, it can be a more reliable option.

Its hard, low skilled work but I've seen worse & done worse - it is true however that a male 25 year old would be able to do it, a 50 year old would struggle. You do however need to speak some english and be able to recognize numbers.
The toughest would be doing this in a frozen warehouse, generally you would do 2 hours in the freezer (-25C) and 2 hours outside. A added disadvantage is that it wrecks your teeth !

You would earn more doing this than say farm picking (which would be harder).
There is sometimes some opportunity to get additional skills (say fork liift truck driving), which would pay more (and be easier).

lostinrates

One of the isues of British high street is opening hours. Its ok for me, I can shop whenever, if you work, especially if you have kids to get to school etc, it must be much harder. One of the reasons shops on the continent thrive is the opening hours suit the shopper better: they are open as people walk home. They are conviently situation within residential areas, and because they are open and well situated people use them,without nee for parking, (its good for people too, they actually move, walk, to buy the days groceries, and because thy can buy little and often easily they are eating fresher produce).

kennyboy66_2

lostinrates wrote: »

One of the isues of British high street is opening hours. Its ok for me, I can shop whenever, if you work, especially if you have kids to get to school etc, it must be much harder. One of the reasons shops on the continent thrive is the opening hours suit the shopper better: they are open as people walk home. They are conviently situation within residential areas, and because they are open and well situated people use them,without nee for parking, (its good for people too, they actually move, walk, to buy the days groceries, and because thy can buy little and often easily they are eating fresher produce).

I've always thought that.
Often in France the fishmonger is open until 7pm (having closed say 1pm-4pm).
How many people cook in this country though ?

chopperharris

bendix wrote: »

What's your point? Do you shop in supermarkets, and if so why? Low prices? Convenience? Would you prefer to revert to the system 40 years ago when shopping meant going from the butcher to the baker to the cheese shop to the fishmonger etc?

Or - on balance - do you get a much better, cheaper shopping service in today's environment.

The system is at it is ONLY because that is what we - the shoppers - want. Attacking them for giving us what we want seems rather silly.

But the customers are brainwashed into beleiving its what they want , when its what they have , there is a huge difference.

We have these big companies saying how meat is british , but its not.

The only conveinence here is to them , we are turkeys voting about christmas.

The talk about ethical business , ethical to whom exactly?I think Jamie and hugh fernley hit the nail on the head on that one.

Even the seasonal veg is imported , or been in some vats of nitrogen for years...yes thats fresh alright.

They badge anything with rain forest alliance ,or helping poor farmers get their fair trade.At the same time forcing british farmers to the edge on milk and meat prices.Seems the french are now once again revolting about their milk prices , perhaps if the british farmer could afford to do the same they too would get a fair trade.

Europe has its super markets , now being eyed up by our big two as expansion points.Yet its high streets are still filled with local produce , and yes its like 40 years ago where people actually do go to the shop everyday to buy fresh and local level.Food prices are for the most part cheaper in europe.

Once the big two move in to an area the customer choice becomes limited , the retail prices are sold at losses , and it destroys independants.Once there is no competition then they will charge what you WILL pay , and sell stock only they want.

Seems the jobs done there if you beleive that you have a choice , a choice not too disimilar to turkeys voting for being free range , sure you might have a better life in the short term but the processing machine will still be giving you the ultimate haircut at neck level.

bendix

I don't know where you live, but my high street is thriving as i described in another thread. There is the supermarket for those who want it, and there are the high street stores for those who don't.

What exactly do you want?