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Comment by s_dev | Hacker News Reader

They also get rid of a lot of "frills" that other grocery stores are accustomed to performing that add to cost e.g. items are still in their transport cardboard boxes on the shelves so employees spend less time stocking shelves, they allow people to take these cardboard boxes home instead of shopping bags and this reduces waste cost.

They dramatically reduce their range which cuts inventory storage. You'll never seem more than one or two instances of the same item. i.e. theres only one type of can of baked beans.

You're expected to pack bags away from the cashier so they can get to billing the next customer and not wasting time packing bags.

They ensure theres always a little bit of a queue so the cashiers are constantly scanning if not they close the till.

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Also the shopping cards have a small chain that attaches to the cart in front of it. You unlock the cart by sliding in a quarter so you can use it while shopping. Since people want their quarter back they have to return the cart to the store. Great solution to eliminate a bag boy sweeping up carts from the lot all day IMO.

Also way back when ALDI didn't even have barcode scanners to save money. There was a person typing all of the items manually into the computer with some 4-6 digit code when you checked out. It was crazy as they were incredibly fast.

> Also the shopping cards have a small chain that attaches to the cart in front of it.

Wait, there are supermarkets that don't have that? How does it work? Do people just leave the shopping carts standing around on the parking lot? Not cynical, geniunely wondering how that works.

Anyway, afaik virtually all supermarkets in Europe have that system. I'm pretty sure Aldi didn't invent it.

The stores in the US mostly have metal "Cart Corrals" where you return the cart. They send out someone to collect them every now and again. This keeps the carts away from the cars, so you don't get dents. But of course, there's always a few lazy people who just leave them all over the place, or (my favorite) launch them towards the corral and turn their back and walk away as the cart careens off-course.

Aldi's system certainly encourages "correct" behavior, but I'd rather not have to take the cart all the way back to get my coin. Especially in a parking lot the size of the typical Costco or Walmart. I'd just hand the cart over to the next arriving customer so I can leave quicker.

As I commented below, there's nothing preventing having both systems. Most European supermarkets have the "cart corrals" with built in coin chains.

You can als just abandon your cart. Someone else will be happy to earn a Euro returning the cart.

Yup. Aldi is the only place in the USA I've seen this. Everywhere else people can and do leave carts all over the parking lot even though there are return sections in the middle of the lot. Many just leave right in their parking space because they are too lazy to walk 20 feet to the nearest collection bin.

Yep. There are stalls for cart return around the parking lot. There's a fair amount of theft. Derelict shopping carts floating around are one of the most reliable markers of a sketchy neighborhood.

In Chicago, some places have a little square outside the main entrance with posts too narrow to fit a shopping cart through, or an "invisible fence" system that locks up the wheels if the carts are brought past a certain line. In that case you have to bring your car around to the loading area and the cart always stays inside the perimeter.

In the US, only Aldi and some urban based supermarkets where homeless people and drunks will run off with the carts use them.

More often these days, they just put an electronic wheel lock on the front wheel to disable the cart when it leaves the lot.

In the UK, it's not the case. Most have carts that have no such feature, though a good proportion do. From my own anecdotal experience living in less desirable areas, the use of the coin system tends to be in areas that would be more likely to have carts taken/stolen.

I think most places used to have the coin system, but it's often been replaced with a wheel lock. There's a wire loop at the perimeter of the car park, which clamps a brake on the rear wheels if the trolley is passed over the loop.

The two systems clearly solve different problems. The coin system is to encourage people to put the cart back in place; the wheel lock to prevent people stealing a cart. A euro fir a cart is not a bad price, if you need one to take with you.

At a branch of downmarket discount retailers B&M recently, I asked the cashier if I could make some change for a trolley. He handed me a sardine-can key and asked if I knew how to use it.

That jimmying the coin operated locking mechanism with part of a tin of fish is considered semi-common knowledge leads me to suspect Britain's trolly theft problem is endemic!

I've also bought a tin of sardines. Just in case.

In our area we have wheel and coin locks. Wheel locks only work in retail parks though as there are too many possible exits in other locations.

In the majority of US supermarkets, there are receptacles in the parking lot for carts. You just find the nearest one and push it in there and leave it after loading your car. It saves a trip back to the store. Later, a store employee will push a line of 20+ carts back all together to the store.

We have this in most supermarkets in Europe, but the receptacles have the chain and key for retrieving your coin. Employees typically carry a fake coin on a keyring for bringing the lines back to the shop.

(Supermarkets also sell branded versions of the fake coins for customers too accustomed to arriving with no spare change for a trolley)

I would hypothesize in the US at least that a large percentage of shoppers would still abandon carts at random, but that enterprising teens / homeless people might step in to collect the deposits, so the store could still avoid needing to assign an employee to do it. That said, I rarely have any coins, so needing have a quarter to take out a cart would be fairly annoying.

My experience is that if a cart is left in the lot, another customer is willing to pick it up and use that cart. A quarter profit and no change digging.

And the quarter is somewhat annoying at times, but regular shoppers often make sure they have on in their car. In addition, there are often folks willing to trade a quarter or make change and the cashiers will often make change as well. If all else fails, they are usually located in locations with other things nearby, so you can buy something smallish and be on your way with the shopping.

>> Also the shopping cards have a small chain that attaches to the cart in front of it. You unlock the cart by sliding in a quarter so you can use it while shopping.

I must admit that the first thing I did after observing this new system was to test whether the chain was long enough to "lock" the cart to itself and get the quarter back without returning the cart. Try it for yourself ;)

Spoiler alert: it will not work. The people in the cart factory attaching the chain will have tested that as well.

Spoiler spoiler alert: you can however lock two carts to each other, though it is a bit of work! I never tested more than two, but the geometry of the situation would make it moderately difficult.

> you can however lock two carts to each other

Not with the ones I've seen in NL, unless you put one cart on top of the other and turn it upside down. Indeed, that's a bit of work, lifting one cart (or pushing both carts flat on their side).

You can make a long chain of a few dozen carts into a ring.

See also http://research.swtch.com/zip

The ShopRite my parents used to go to when I was 10 (which would be in the mid 90s) had this, so it's not exactly a big strategic play on Aldi's part.

It's done in their home market Germany since the beginning of the 80s.

At least in the UK that's not true any more. Both Aldi and Lidl have moved out of bottom end discount and now also have premium lines too. So now for many lines you'll find discount, mid and premium versions - all still private label, all still styled to match equivalent brand or competing supermarket range. Lidl's premium meats are suspiciously close to Tesco premium range branding for instance, but vastly better. Still far fewer lines than Tesco or Sainsbury, but a heck of a lot more than five years or so ago when it was typically one of each thing.

Quality wise they beat the other supermarkets by a long way, except Waitrose or Co Op, on most things. There are exceptions, Aldi cheese is awful.

I come from a country where there are always plenty of open cashiers and no lines. If I saw a queue there I would leave and not go shopping because its either overloaded or some system was down. When I first came to Germany I kept seeing the queue and thinking "oh, I will come back later when it isn't so busy". But I have noticed the reverse occurs too. If there is an idle cashier no one goes to them. They assume, due to the absence of the queue that it isn't open yet or something, so they head straight for the queue.

Aldi in Ireland (and I'm assuming the rest of Europe too) has a new system in place. If sensors above the checkouts detect the lines are too long an automated voice will announce "Checkout 2 will open soon, please start unloading your goods on to the belt". 30 seconds later another announcement will say "Operator to checkout 2 please" so the operator arrives to a checkout with a fully loaded belt.

And the reverse happens as well, when the line reduces another announcement will state that the checkout is closing and customers should not approach that checkout.

I'm always amazed at the little things Aldi does to make their process even more efficient.

I've seen these at Lidl in Germany, too. It's really great; when a new checkout opens, I see the green light coming up and can immediately take first place in that queue.

One trick that I find helpful: When in the queue, leave some space to the person before you, to make the queue appear longer and thus incentivize the cashier to open the next checkout.

Lidl UK and Aldi UK are rolling this out too

Noticed that too. So classically german.

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