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Comment by mogadsheu | Hacker News Reader

I believe this is less of a technology issue than a culture/adoption issue, and if widely adopted, could really improve consumer efficiency.

The idea makes plenty of sense from both a producer and a consumer standpoint. Packaging, especially when not automated, accounts for a significant portion of the cost of goods for many basic goods.

You already see this in grocery stores: the deli counter and often the nuts/grains sections, and I'd argue the produce section use minimal packaging. Expanding this to other sections seems like a pretty straightforward to reduce deadweight, if consumers adopt the practice.

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I wish grocery stores near me had better bulk goods sections. I notice the ones that exist are currently presented as upscale choices, and are often more expensive than the packaged goods.

I think consumers will widely adopt the practice when it lowers, or at least doesn't increase, their grocery bill.

> I wish grocery stores near me had better bulk goods sections.

Do you have a wholesale near you, such as Costco?

Costco fits a rather different definition of “bulk”. They carry 50 lb bags of rice, but they don’t have dispensers where you can fill your own bag and pay by weight, which is what GP was almost certainly referring to.

Try a local food coop.

Bulk foods section are a disease vector, though. I see both unattended kids and adults "grazing" in the bulk section of stores like Sprouts, hand to bin to mouth to hand to bin, repeat across the spectrum of bulk goodies.

I've seen kids wet their fingers in their mouths and "dip" them into bins as their parents watch, unconcerned.

On their way to the store, most bulk products have been expectorated on by a number of sweaty men in dirty boots. It's not obvious to me how packaging would lower that number.

My mom and pop butcher uses old school butcher paper to wrap my steaks which he cuts after I tell him what I want. The local chain used styrofoam, cold packs, and plastic wrap.

The popularity of packaged goods (even though bulk goods are pretty well available) provides some contrary evidence that it would improve consumer efficiency (at least if you measure what consumers think instead of cost/calorie or whatever).

Things like prepared vegetables and prepackaged deli meats are getting more popular, not less popular.

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