I’m old enough to vaguely remember check outs before price scanners came along. It must have been more interesting, or at least more challenging, to be a clerk back then.
I had never heard about any solar eclipse but saw some photos “LeadingEdge” posted on Calvin & Hobbes. Amazing! Did you get to see it? We had a “Red Moon” here a couple of years ago. I stayed up past until 3am to see it! It was lovely. Tried to get a decent photo but couldn’t. Well, what did I expect? I didn’t have a proper high quality night camera, I just had my phone.
Off to the city again tomorrow. I never used to do anything with my Saturdays before but now I love to get out and about. I don’t want to waste them. I’m also back at work on Tuesday because Monday is a Bank Holiday.
So – back in the day – bread was 39 CENTS per loaf – and the checkers rang everything up by hand. NOW bread is more like $1.00 per loaf – and we have automatic scanners. Hmmmmm – that almost seems like we are going BACKWARD! Of course, the price of wheat is still around $2 per bushel – which is about what the price of wheat was back in the 1950s. I guess whoever it is who has been making progress – it must NOT have been the farmers!
And the cool ka-chunk ka-chunk sound that old price marker made as the stock BOY got into a rhythm marking a whole case of canned green beans. As a kid I LOVED playing “store” — making up what would be on sale and for how much, setting up my little maple table as a counter. What a nerd! But I still love that stuff!
My brother worked at one of the local markets for a while, and my best friend’s mother worked at another with Vi, both check-out “girls”. Vi was probably in her ’60s, with her rouge and her perm always in place. She kept us kids in line when we came in on our own. My mother knew the first names of the owner of a third little market and his wife. Our little town just outside Chicago in the ’50s; hard to believe how much things changed!
I work at a country store with an old-fashioned feel; we have computers, yes, but no scanners. We manually type the codes in to cash people out. I have a good number of codes memorized.
Before scanners the customer got a better deal. I use to stamp the price on the product when stocking shelves. New stock might see a price increase but the old stock still carried to old price. Rotated to the front to get rid of it first the current customer got the better price still. With scanners the price goes up in the system and the old stock sells for more. Profit margin up for the store on the old item since it cost them less and you paid more. Worse still not incentive to rotate the old stock out.
I worked in a hardware store in Boulder in the mid 70s. Had to punch everything in and the register would figure the tax on the first $100. I guess that the people who set those up didn’t expect sales to be more than that. At Christmas time, it was a favourite place to shop, and I had more than a few sales more than $100 (for some reason the register kept track inside; it just wouldn’t show the operator that an extra $5 or so was needed) I caught on pretty quickly, and added it onto the receipt, and no one argued. The day after the busiest day, a bookkeeper came to me and told me that my drawer had finished with over $10,000 in it and was correct to the penny. Some time after, a manager managed to convince his fellows that I made too many mistakes at the register, and should be fired, when, in fact, the real reason was that I had made a good suggestion to a customer about how to solve a problem he had, and the manager had not come up with the idea, and he was angry that it made me look smarter than he was. Another manager was a bit surprised, as he liked my ideas, and the mistakes kept happening, as the other CB was not very good on the register…
Templo S.U.D. over 7 years ago
Fred Meyer perhaps?
Cronkers McGee Premium Member over 7 years ago
There’s nothing better than yelling at a Fred!
GirlGeek Premium Member over 7 years ago
Snoopy making my mundane job enjoyable puts a smile on my face before I have to go back to said job later in the morning.
coreym5 over 7 years ago
Snoopy is in full Walter Mitty mode this week.
scpandich over 7 years ago
I’m old enough to vaguely remember check outs before price scanners came along. It must have been more interesting, or at least more challenging, to be a clerk back then.
Darryl Heine over 7 years ago
Pretend the 1970 Snoopy is working at Dollar Tree or Dollar General or Family Dollar as the store clerk.
JoeMartinFan Premium Member over 7 years ago
Charles Schulz sure knew how to make the mundane interesting and amusing. And he did it long before “Seinfeld.”
Number Three over 7 years ago
Smooth Peanut Butter all the way!
I think I’m in the minority because everyone seems to like the crunchy.
xxx
LivelyClamor over 7 years ago
Now I remember what things cost in 1970! :-)
Number Three over 7 years ago
@Snoopy_Fan
Thank you!
I had never heard about any solar eclipse but saw some photos “LeadingEdge” posted on Calvin & Hobbes. Amazing! Did you get to see it? We had a “Red Moon” here a couple of years ago. I stayed up past until 3am to see it! It was lovely. Tried to get a decent photo but couldn’t. Well, what did I expect? I didn’t have a proper high quality night camera, I just had my phone.
Off to the city again tomorrow. I never used to do anything with my Saturdays before but now I love to get out and about. I don’t want to waste them. I’m also back at work on Tuesday because Monday is a Bank Holiday.
Hope your weekend is absolutely Tip-Top!
♥♥♥
gopher gofer over 7 years ago
↑ is there a particular reason you feel the need to use peanuts’ comments section for your personal email…?
LoisG Premium Member over 7 years ago
So – back in the day – bread was 39 CENTS per loaf – and the checkers rang everything up by hand. NOW bread is more like $1.00 per loaf – and we have automatic scanners. Hmmmmm – that almost seems like we are going BACKWARD! Of course, the price of wheat is still around $2 per bushel – which is about what the price of wheat was back in the 1950s. I guess whoever it is who has been making progress – it must NOT have been the farmers!
dogday Premium Member over 7 years ago
And the cool ka-chunk ka-chunk sound that old price marker made as the stock BOY got into a rhythm marking a whole case of canned green beans. As a kid I LOVED playing “store” — making up what would be on sale and for how much, setting up my little maple table as a counter. What a nerd! But I still love that stuff!
dogday Premium Member over 7 years ago
My brother worked at one of the local markets for a while, and my best friend’s mother worked at another with Vi, both check-out “girls”. Vi was probably in her ’60s, with her rouge and her perm always in place. She kept us kids in line when we came in on our own. My mother knew the first names of the owner of a third little market and his wife. Our little town just outside Chicago in the ’50s; hard to believe how much things changed!
Taracinablue over 7 years ago
I work at a country store with an old-fashioned feel; we have computers, yes, but no scanners. We manually type the codes in to cash people out. I have a good number of codes memorized.
vtdba over 7 years ago
Before scanners the customer got a better deal. I use to stamp the price on the product when stocking shelves. New stock might see a price increase but the old stock still carried to old price. Rotated to the front to get rid of it first the current customer got the better price still. With scanners the price goes up in the system and the old stock sells for more. Profit margin up for the store on the old item since it cost them less and you paid more. Worse still not incentive to rotate the old stock out.
Cami Su Buster over 7 years ago
I worked in a hardware store in Boulder in the mid 70s. Had to punch everything in and the register would figure the tax on the first $100. I guess that the people who set those up didn’t expect sales to be more than that. At Christmas time, it was a favourite place to shop, and I had more than a few sales more than $100 (for some reason the register kept track inside; it just wouldn’t show the operator that an extra $5 or so was needed) I caught on pretty quickly, and added it onto the receipt, and no one argued. The day after the busiest day, a bookkeeper came to me and told me that my drawer had finished with over $10,000 in it and was correct to the penny. Some time after, a manager managed to convince his fellows that I made too many mistakes at the register, and should be fired, when, in fact, the real reason was that I had made a good suggestion to a customer about how to solve a problem he had, and the manager had not come up with the idea, and he was angry that it made me look smarter than he was. Another manager was a bit surprised, as he liked my ideas, and the mistakes kept happening, as the other CB was not very good on the register…