How will autimation and robots change kroger? What jobs will be left?
meat shop could wind up with more prepackaged stuff (like walmart has), but you're never going to replace someone in the meat who cuts and packages exactly what the customer wants.
DSD will probably be around awhile. Many companies have gone to pay-per-scan which in essence takes away from the receiving process, but someone still has to unload trucks and such.
I can't really see grocery, produce, deli, etc going automated. Too much stuff comes in messed up to be able to handle it with robots.
Same could be said for front end: the bogus customer requests, money services, returns ,etc will have to be handled by a person.
The only thing I can see it affecting is the warehouses. Maybe baggers, I'm not sure why someone hasn't created a way to retrieve carts automatically yet. Like a homing thing where if they sit for so long, they go to their "dock" I know that's out there, but it would save man hours on the lot!
Aldi and some others have a $.25 deposit on carts.
A lot of the new stuff (and old stuff) depends too much on customers. Customers are untrustworthy. It's going to be difficult to balance shrink and saving on hours.
There's already massive amounts of theft, purposeful and accidental, at SCO.
I haven't used "Scan Bag Go". What keeps people from just loading up whatever they want?
Kroger also has a hard time balancing greed and efficiency.
Kroger is going to just keep strangling pennies and cutting hours until Amazon starts to lay the smackdown on them. Kroger doesn't have a clue about efficiency and has no idea what is going on in their own stores.
Kroger isn't smart enough nor agile enough to turn things around, so that will be the beginning of the end right there.
Scan Bag Go is apparently going to be rolled out to more stores in the upcoming year.
I like how we don't learn from the YEARS of experience. Kroger is horrible with Non-Foods, Marketplaces stores might as well eliminate the aisle of stuff people don't go down or buy! These items are overpriced and cheap, which Amazon sells for 1/2 the price! If anyone has been around, they have seen Marketplaces sections being dramatically cut in size. Anyone see a customer by a Dyson from Kroger? Anyone see anyone buying Kroger Bed Sheets? If the items are all "Our Brands" (Private Brands) they should be cheaper and better quality. Clicklist should have been established with delivery only, which eliminates out of stocks with orders and the customer issues at pickup (If the order isn't ready, don't release for delivery. I'm thinking if you give customers 2 hours for a delivery window and have the order correct and the person isn't a crackhead they will be 100% Satisfied. Hell, if there is an issue give them "Communicate by Text or Phone" if a question about product is needed, give them the option.
Some stores with ClickList do offer home delivery, but it has been a disaster since Kroger partnered with Uber and Uber has really dropped the ball big time. Kroger went the cheap route (obviously) rather than handling home delivery itself (like Safeway/Tom Thumb does). ClickList has been poorly managed in general, which surprises me since Kroger sees ClickList as the future and wants to move as much of its business over to ClickList as possible in order to reduce in-store foot traffic and cut hours across the board.
Meat Market probably will do less and less cutting in the future... Kroger logic is fewer meat cutters means more people that can just be paid minimum wage to stock packages of meat.
At some point, File Maintenance will likely have less of a presence once Kroger converts over to electronic/digital shelf tags.
Kroger would eliminate courtesy clerks if the company could get away with it. Kroger knows though many of its self-entitled and pampered customers would throw a huge fit if Kroger went the route of Aldi as far as carts go.
More self scans might replace full service/express registers down the line. That, or a bigger push to roll out Scan Bag Go or something similar at more stores.
Kroger will never be able to eliminate all jobs in its stores, but technology will definitely allow the company to continue to shrink its overall workforce numbers as time goes on.
It would have been interesting if Kroger used a Non-Store Clicklist option with delivery or even pickup. Eliminate all the expenses and just have warehouse shelving with items still in boxes, centralized location would allow easy of shipping or pickup.
More Self Checkouts will definitely still occur, specially with the constant Staffing Issues.
Deli, Bakery, Meat will definitely increase in prepackaged items.
Milk should be delivered on movable shelving, Milk Crates seem very outdated.
Technology is good, but it would be interesting to see how its implemented. Too many times, a technology program is introduced that isn't ready for the real world. Order Evolution is/was a good example. Instead of simple cutting orders and having empty ares....why didn't allocations or facings cut. I don't think any store needs 15 facings of Kroger Peanut Butter on a shelf that's 24in deep, anyone ever wonder why 24pack water on a shelf when its ordered by the pallet? Which stores have 6 feet of CocaCola 12 packs 4 feet high?
krogers is gone in 5 years on the current route they're on. I purposely didn't capitalize the name because I have no respect for the company anymore.
krogers today is when ego takes precedence over EVERYTHING. The corporate ego is bigger than you, me, your family, your store, even the bottom line. Our company is headed by narcissistic sociopaths running a muck and when the **** hits the fan, they don't have life boats, they have life yachts while we drowned.
I'm in the cincy division, they already do home delivery as a test in 2 stores. It's essentially contracted work, so no liability when krogers sends a released felon to delivery groceries to your grandmother.
In the long run it will basically be a store run by self check cashiers. The upgraded version is where customers pull their cart into a sensor area and it scans every thing. They might be lucky and have a beggar at the end. You'll still have your one cashier monitoring four to six stations to be sure all is flowing smoothly.
The difficulty of this is individuals who refuse technology will not be able to purchase any thing. They'll just become a bigger *ss to deal with. As they'll be lost in time and to be able to under stand the how to.
