Corporate power and their marketing will never behave in the best interests of the common people.

It is my firm belief that it is the Banks are the biggest leaches on our community - Power, not necessarily just money is their aim.

Just one example is how the Trucking Industry has killed off Railways - Poor Joe wants an independent life, he goes to "Bank" cap in hand and the wonderful bank lends him the money to buy a brand new, shiny, bells and whistles, Road train.
Poor Joe has a snowballs chance in hell of ever paying off the loan as an independent trucker.
Joe has to accept a contract with "Mr Big Transport" to stave off the wolves (read Banks) - having to work stupid hours just to eke out a living. Paying premium rates to bank for a truck he will never own outright.

If the loans manager at the bank only allowed Joe the funds to buy a little Pantech or Flatbed - Joe may have been able to have his dream come true.

Franchises are all in a similar vain - it doesn't matter what the product is - Fill a poor couples head with gobbledygook - Promise the World (verbally only) - have them sign an airtight contract, which in reality is a slavery agreement for the couple and their unfortunate offspring.

Some Pigs are more equal than others.

About a year ago I looked at all the receipts from hardware stores. 

 

I thought I was going to Bunning all the time (they are closer to where I live).

 

It turned out that I ended up going to a proper hardware stores instead of kids store.

 

Bunnings do not stock for example.

 

Drills in 0.1mm increments.

Sandpaper up to 7000 grit.

Tap & dies, taps in taper, intermediate & bottom.

Taps in all the metric & imperial threads.

316 stainless screws that don't break.

10.8 volt Bosch drills etc.

Stahlwille spanners & sockets.

 

Just to name a few.

 

 

They are as useless as t--s on a bull.

 

If they start stocking the items I need them it will be easier for my shopping.

Just a thought on the trucking industry. Not meant to criticize the industry. but, the roads are becoming almost undriveable, and costs $m's to repair. Congestion is another issue. We hear almost daily of serious accidents involving cars and trucks. I am not saying that the industry is at fault in these incidents.

But, I do think, we need to consider carefully, just what goods are carried by trucks and perhaps maybe carried by trains?.

Is it really necessary for toilet paper, (as an example) to be trucked overnight say from Sydney to Melbourne? Who needs toilet paper that badly?

"Just in time warehousing" is a contributor to this issue. Nothing is stocked locally.

Or is it the internet? A business puts something up for sale on the internet, they get an order, it is supplied from their central warehouse and trucked to the buyer, often overnight, because we, as consumers cannot wait.

In fact, this is quite a complex issue and bears a more indepth look. On the surface, if businesses were to stock more goods in their places of business, the need for a lot of the quick overland transport would be considerably less.

And to my mind, this would relieve congestion, damage and repairs to roads etc.

I realise this not going to fix everything or maybe nothing and it also is at odds with current general business practices which would upset CFO's of large conglomerates (wreck their bottom line) larger costs for small business because their stocking levels would need to increase (finance costs) upset the truckers because fewer required, but would it be worth it for safer roads?

What about less carbon emissions, better to lessen carbon though trucks rather than cows.  That could be another whole topic.  Do railways have less co2 emissions?

-- Edited by msg on Friday 23rd of February 2024 02:32:47 PM

Are We Lost wrote:

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msg wrote:

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Is it really necessary for toilet paper, (as an example) to be trucked overnight say from Sydney to Melbourne? Who needs toilet paper that badly?

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 Overnight or in a week makes little difference. It would still be a truck on the highway and the driver's time the same.

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 You are quite right Are We Lost.  But what about sending certain goods by train that do not require quick delivery. Benefits could be substantial. 

Could there be a cost reduction for train transport?  Certainly a road congestion and road damage benefit. Especially if they build overpass or underpasses on the roads.  

G'day MSG.

I ordered something on-line at 2.00pm yesterday 22/2 from somewhere near Newcastle NSW, expecting it sometime next week to a small regional town near Wagga Wagga. Around midday today 23/2 on returning back from an hour out, the item was sitting next to front door. I have no idea how it arrived so quick.

I ordered something from Cranbourne South East of Melbourne on the 2/2 and didn't arrive until 20/2, that was after a few phone calls and complaining on the 19/2.


Keep Safe

as far as retail sector goes, I think we have probably got what we deserve, we voted with our wallets an they have responded.

unless you are sending goods in large volumes (bulk) rail is very inefficient.

JayDee,

Coles and Woolworths whilst they have the largest footprint, they have competition in the form of Aldi, Foodland, Drakes Supermarkets and IGA.  Personally the majority of my shopping is with Drakes and IGA, Coles comes in 3^rd, Woolies and Aldi almost never.

In metro areas yes the dominate hardware is Bunnings but there are smaller hardware stores around you just need to look, when you get out of the larger population areas this in where the independant hardware stores. Remember Bunnings was started by the Burns Phillp company which aquired Coles Meyer.

Coles Meyer started Officeworks  in 1994 after aquiring Viking Office supplies an on line retailer, and then Harris Technology taht was then I began to grow, there are plenty of newsagents  that are successful and continue to thrive the biggest money spinner and profit for the comes from Lotto and scratchies, books and magazines are continuing to decline because of online purchases, its not officeworks thats killing them.

Peter,

The banking industry is faceing the biggest challenges that is why branches are closing, their face to face contact with customers is make small branches unprofitable as the majority of the people are using the online rather than going to a branch. In the past 4 years I have been in a branch twice. 

Possum

The biggest failing of the rail freight system was it inability to be flexible, when our family had a vinyard in regional Victoria the railfreight system could not pickup fruit from the farm in the afternoon and then deliver it to market in Melb or Sydney by 3am the nxt day. Then the road freight sourced back loads of general freight back to the towns along the way. Many a large trucking company grew from a couple of single axle semis into a major transport network, our small town had 2 brothers stated with a truck each and now moves freight all over Australia.

At the end of the day these behemoth companies create employment, remember both coles and woolies evolved from a dept stores in main street towns  into what they are today. Even Bunnings aquired Adelaide Tools to have a specialist tool business to cater for proffessional, their tool shops within the big green shed are aimed at the home reno and handyman who buys the cheaper brands for the casual use.

 

Dougwe wrote:

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G'day MSG.

I ordered something on-line at 2.00pm yesterday 22/2 from somewhere near Newcastle NSW, expecting it sometime next week to a small regional town near Wagga Wagga. Around midday today 23/2 on returning back from an hour out, the item was sitting next to front door. I have no idea how it arrived so quick.

I ordered something from Cranbourne South East of Melbourne on the 2/2 and didn't arrive until 20/2, that was after a few phone calls and complaining on the 19/2.


Keep Safe

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 And like Doug , I'm not that far from him and I ordered something on evil bay last thursday night and allowing for weekend was at PO Box monday morning. Funny how some things get to a small town quick and other times take forever.

Inside information about one of the big supermarkets shows how staff rosters are used in an, apparent, effort to train in-store customers to use the self-service checkouts and to have Internet connected customers to use on-line ordering.    Fewer early start staffer are being rostered on and start times have been pushed back a half hour as a way of the store paying less in early start penalty wages.    Supervising staff at the service desk and on the self checkout area have also been reduced.    The reduction of helping staff on the checkouts means much longer wait times when the robot Maningridas the checkout has a sad and requires you to call for a staff member to log in and tell the robot to settle down, nothing to see here.    If a disabled customer turns up and needs extended help scanning items collected in the conveniently supplied wheelchair friendly trolly, self checkout customers with a station requiring human guidance to the limited AI equipped robot can now wait several minutes while the disabled customer gets the help they need.    In-store customers are more and more an annoyance rather than an opportunity to build brand (store) loyalty.

Try doing an early visit to Bunnings on a week day.    Early, the only checkout opportunity available is the service desk.    Another example of saving staff costs through clever rostering of start times.

Computer modelling for crowd control and management started all this.   Patterns of people movement and demand for provision of services has been refined for many years now.   My source tells me that even the volume of sales and how they were distributed, of hot cross buns, is analysed across the country.     Bakery staff in the store I have knowledge of are told when to have specific products ready in a Just-in-Time logistics type technique that values process and profit over people.

Yesterday in Woolworths (or Coles for that matter) I was at one of the very few cash checkouts.

 

It failed.

 

I knew the value of the one product I was buying. Gave enough money to the staff member & said you sort it out & simply walked out with un-scanned item.

 

I have paid for it & it's on camera.

 

Probably caused endless paperwork, but I will continue to do that until these companies pull their fingers' out.

Izabarack wrote:

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Inside information about one of the big supermarkets shows how staff rosters are used in an, apparent, effort to train in-store customers to use the self-service checkouts and to have Internet connected customers to use on-line ordering.    Fewer early start staffer are being rostered on and start times have been pushed back a half hour as a way of the store paying less in early start penalty wages.    Supervising staff at the service desk and on the self checkout area have also been reduced.    The reduction of helping staff on the checkouts means much longer wait times when the robot Maningridas the checkout has a sad and requires you to call for a staff member to log in and tell the robot to settle down, nothing to see here.    If a disabled customer turns up and needs extended help scanning items collected in the conveniently supplied wheelchair friendly trolly, self checkout customers with a station requiring human guidance to the limited AI equipped robot can now wait several minutes while the disabled customer gets the help they need.    In-store customers are more and more an annoyance rather than an opportunity to build brand (store) loyalty.

Try doing an early visit to Bunnings on a week day.    Early, the only checkout opportunity available is the service desk.    Another example of saving staff costs through clever rostering of start times.

Computer modelling for crowd control and management started all this.   Patterns of people movement and demand for provision of services has been refined for many years now.   My source tells me that even the volume of sales and how they were distributed, of hot cross buns, is analysed across the country.     Bakery staff in the store I have knowledge of are told when to have specific products ready in a Just-in-Time logistics type technique that values process and profit over people.

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 That is a problem for a Customer Oriented business-  The Customers 

Grey Nomads are probably the worst offenders, because they are retired, they try and save a few bucks and don't go to the local IGA or Hardware shop, they go to Woollies/Coles or Bunnings, especially when travelling, they usually stock up first and think they are supporting the local towns when they go through because they have stayed in the caravan park or bought a coffee at the local cafe. Well thats what i noticed in my travels around OZ.

When I took a redundancy pack back in 1995 I was the State Sales Manager of one of the largest food suppliers in Australia. Back then we had to pay Woolworths and Coles hefty fees when we introduced a new product to the market. Also for a weekly special plus the product/s to be mass displayed on a Gondola, the fee was around $5000.
The term co-operative advertising and rebates was equal to 5% of the retailer's total company purchases. Huge $$$ rebates. Now consider that practice right across the board and the rebate per annum would be in the many millions, that was back in 1995. After listening and reading about the duopoly, the fees and charges seem to have increased three-fold in today's marketplace.


OK, now consider this.
The two giants are promoting home delivery. The computer grocery order is completed by the customer, the store then employs staff to assemble the said order and it is then delivered to the front door of the customer. All this costs the customer who wants home delivery service, cost of around $15.
So how do the two retailers cover the cost of this transaction. We the customers including the home delivery client are hit with the large price increases over the store's range. I bet that this type of service is not a headline in the inquiry into the retail trade.
We are being forced into the "service industry" with no or very little thought given to what we the customers want.
There endth today's lesson.

Jay&Dee

With home delivery, F&V you take what you get. Most of the time it's what the shoppers instore don't pick. I get click & collect quite often. I never get exactly what I ordered. Just wish they would get it right once. Never allow substitutes. Some of the pickers have no idea. But, I am pretty picky.