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Efficiencies in Supermarket Checkout Lines

posted by martyb on Sunday September 18 2016, @04:56PM   Printer-friendly
from the slowest-line-is-the-one-I'm-in dept.

Appalbarry writes:

The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation reports on a former math teacher who claims to solved the question "Which checkout line up will be fastest?"

In a nutshell he has concluded that the number of people in the lineup is more important than the number of items a person has in their cart.

The critical factor, he says, is the average of 41 seconds that it takes a shopper to pay the cashier and engage in idle chit chat.

So a long line of people in the Express line, with two or three items each, will actual move slower than the checkout with one guy with a full shopping cart.

YMMV.

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  • (Score: 3, Touché) by VanderDecken on Sunday September 18 2016, @09:56PM

    by VanderDecken (5216) on Sunday September 18 2016, @09:56PM (#403525)

    I find the biggest single factor is the clerk. At my regular store I'll look for the one who processes things quickly, even if she had four extra people in line, rather than the slow-as-molasses one who had to examine everything in detail before slooooowly scanning it... And then try to figure out the optimal way of putting canned goods on top of my bread loaves.

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  • (Score: 1) by kramulous on Monday September 19 2016, @05:41AM

    by kramulous (255) on Monday September 19 2016, @05:41AM (#403626)

    Yup. I always do a very quick items per minute estimate of the checkout clerk.

    I remember something about the number of people in the line taking longer being part of a paper published years ago. I take it into consideration but, here in Aus, majority people just wave their cards to the sensor and the transaction completes in a second or two. It is not really much of an issue.