This should be interesting...

[Dreamstalker]

I heard yesterday that my store (not sure whether it's the entire division, or just my region) is going to start directly competing with another chain. Ironically, said chain was very close to being owned by my employer at one time. They have a following for having very low prices, and assorted reasons for the low prices (questionable and varying quality, nonunion etc).

So after January 1, we will be lowering prices or trying to and--I assume--price-matching. Cue the scammers; I foresee huge headaches if this is done wrong (which it will be). The competitor doesn't use a loyalty card, although I don't think we'll do away with ours as many customers like the gas points and every so often we partner with local schools so customers can earn points that equal to money given to the school at the end of the quarter/year (also, the store card is how associates get their discount--do away with that and there will be a riot).

Deli Manager was ripshit the other day because it turns out that DC has been subbing the cheaper non-brandname deli meats in his orders, and the plastic on the cheaper stuff gets caught in the slicer and makes its way into customer orders. We're lucky they came back to the store and didn't run to Corporate. Knowing what I now do, a lot of our orders are probably going to be changed to have the cheaper of two options (hey idiots, there's a reason we don't get the cheapest--it sucks!).

[DerangedHermit]

Aside from posting a billion signs that say "NEW LOW EVERYDAY PRICE!!!!!!1!!ONE!WON", nothing will really change. No price matching, card will obviously still stick around.

They did this here in October, and it's just the same posturing every other store does.

What will be interesting is when my store gets the new registers and POS system. They've been rolling it out spottily in other areas, but I imagine they'll start to kick it into overdrive post-holidays.

[Dreamstalker]

Ours are supposed to get replaced next month. I don't get why they didn't do it over the summer when things were relatively quiet. As it is now, in the past two weeks we've had the EFT system hang/crash twice (always during a rush), two SCOs down, and the remaining registers have daily hissyfits. Even the tech hates working on what we have.

I got sworn at yesterday because we don't pricematch...if you're so bent on saving 30 cents on bananas, go down the road then (the kicker was, he already had full bags from that store). ASM was there so I couldn't tell the guy off. Hopefully I'll be (for the most part) off the front end soon so won't have to deal with tantrums...but this adds a new level of fun to pricing.

[Teskeria]

I got sworn at yesterday because we don't pricematch...if you're so bent on saving 30 cents on bananas, go down the road then (the kicker was, he already had full bags from that store).

because they didn't have bananas. it's easy to quote a low price on something you are out of.

[Dreamstalker]

The other store sells bananas per piece...going by that pricing, we would actually be cheaper.