A Kroger is not equipped to handle distribution of food to those in need. And I will 100% guarantee you that if they just leave the dumpsters unlocked, it will mostly be upper middle class college kids “dumpster diving” who grab the food… until one of them gets stabbed and the entire program is shut down forever.
I would like to see more effort to work with local charities and food banks to donate food but… a surprising number of supermarkets already do that. The issue is that there just aren’t enough food banks because NIMBYs kill them out of fear it will lead to “too many homeless people. and poors”. Which gets back to the issue of trying to get food to centralized locations which increase costs, cause issues with food that is fine if it is kept refrigerated, etc.
Like, for as massively fucked as it is to see an entire aisle of cereal get thrown into a bin and the latch locked, that is not “the problem”. The problem is that we as a society do everything we can to make life inhospitable for the less well off in the hopes that they die and go away.
Retrofitting so many buildings and hiring out the staff, and training them, is just not viable. Or even a good idea. You might as well want all of them to have helicopter pads and hotels attached.
Food banks exist. There should be more of them. But they are a very different kind of building than a supermarket and you need a VERY different kind of staff to be able to actually help those who need it rather than wander off because you are getting paid minimum wage and its your smoke break.
Rather than defeat the idea, why not try to think of ways it could work. Ideas need time to grow and flourish with revisions. Nothing is made perfectly the first time. What changes to the idea would you make in good faith?
Just because an idea won’t happen doesn’t mean we can’t explore the ‘what if’ :)
There isn’t much to retrofit. It could be like adding another pharmacy department counter.
There is no way this “could work” because it is a fundamentally bad idea.
A food bank is not just a cart full of loaves of bread. It involves people who know how to engage with various government programs and how to tell people how to engage with it. And, the good ones, involve people who know how to help the people who need to use said food bank.
Like I said above: the issue is not the food. It is the counties. It is getting people to allow a food bank to even exist in their county. And you can 100% bet that if it is such a struggle to allow one to be opened that they will not be cool with The Poors “shopping” in the same supermarket they do.
The issue is that you are approaching this from a REALLY shitty direction. Because the vast majority of the people losing their god damned minds over supermarkets dumping excess food? it isn’t the needy. It is college kids who decided they want to dumpster dive because that will let them save money on food to spend on weed. Because yes, supermarkets waste a LOT of food. But if you actually look into this at all from a “helping the needy” perspective, the issue isn’t the amount of food wasted (which generally isn’t actually THAT much because supermarkets would rather sell food than dump it) and more the distribution to the needy and actually having a food bank/shelter/soup kitchen in a given county/area. And distribution to the needy is almost universally stopped by NIMBYs
Staff from the store itself. I see no barrier for a large business with m/billions in profit to add additional staff to run the food bank area.
To add a capitalist view: the food bank brings in people who might buy more. Yes, they are there to get food for survival, but the money saved might be spent on other goods like clothes or supplies in the store. (Stuff they need but wouldn’t be able to buy for food budget reasons).
So you’re not suggesting some sort of legal requirement? You want a company to voluntarily add labor cost, storage costs, any liability, equipment costs, etc on the chance people coming in for food assistance might buy stuff that not all grocery stores even carry?
Companies aren’t going to do that voluntarily, that’s not a realistic expectation. The ROI on your suggestion doesn’t make sense, the only way something like that gets staffed is if you convince states to pass some sort of requirement that companies do this…
You may want to take your own advice, coming up with unrealistic solutions to every realistic problem posed to you isnt helpful either.
Loss leaders is a sales strategy that does not require additional overhead like permanent staffing, storage, and additional liability. Suggesting that they are makes it seem like you don’t understand sales, Operations, or logistics. I’m really trying to grasp how you think your “solutions” are helpful. Would you be comfortable providing insight into what industry you have the most experience in so that I can try to see it through the lens your looking at the problem through? (i.e. finance, customer service, procurement, etc).
Social work. I work in social work. I added loss leaders as a comment to provide context that stores make financial decisions that are a loss for the specific reason of getting more people to the store so they buy more. A food bank might be a loss that leads to more sales.
Ok. I got my “free food”, but maybe I want some ketchup for my potatoes too? I don’t mean to imply a foodbank will bring in net profits, but it can lessen the cost of running the bank.
Is a food store having a charity branch unrealistic?
Ok, that makes sense. Thanks for the work you do in a difficult field. But honestly I think you’re overly optimistic about a potential business case for this idea.
I apologize this is likely gonna be long.
Loss leaders are designed to pay for themselves over an average of other items bought so the store is never actually losing money. Some fast food places do this with food vs drinks. The cost to them for a drink is a few cents but they charge a couple dollars. That’s a 200%+ return in profit on the drinks which covers the cost of the drink and the margin of loss on the food plus some. Ketchup isn’t gonna do that. Things people might buy to supplement aren’t gonna do that. (If we were talking about lowering the cost of potatoes to get people to buy ketchup and condiments for them? maybe?) Labor is a huge expense, people cost more than their salary (401k, benefits, etc.) If someone makes $20K a company likely calculates their cost at $40K. So three full time employees to work the counter, work in back, etc is like $120,000 a year (assuming full time employees at $10 an hour) just in labor costs for 1 store. You would also need regional managers, lawyers, etc to run the program and they cost a lot more, plus the regionals travel expenses etc. Loss leaders at a grocery store isn’t gonna even dent that cost. Add to that the overhead for the building, storage, upkeep of the space. They might make some of it back on tax write-offs but why do all that when I can give $.25 off the profit on a can of beans to charity and write that off without the additional liability/cost of a food bank? I can give cash, write it off, and use it in my ads to appear less capitalist greedy oversteer. When I can use the space a food bank would take up to sell overpriced sugar? That’s lost opportunity cost on that floor space and that could cost $100,000+ a year depending on how much space the food bank would require. Per store. That’s millions a year for sure to get back? Not much from the companies perspective.
A charity branch? No. Food banks that they run out of every store? Yes. From a business perspective it doesn’t make any sense at all, that’s why you’ve never seen one even at more “progressive” grocery stores. A charity branch will make cash donations, set up “sales for charity” schemes, and do what some people have already commented and donate the food to local charities. All for that sweet sweet tax write off money. The logistics of that transfer with meat plus the additional liability is why you’re unlikely to see them donate it even if the food bank has a fridge. The issue is with getting it from the store to the food bank.
You’re getting a lot of pushback from people in this thread because your stance that a grocer would do this voluntarily is, in a business sense, wildly optimistic and bordering on absurd. The only real path I see towards this idea (which I do think is an ideal that’s worth striving towards) is if the government mandated it. The issue there (in the US, I’m US based and understand that system best) is that it would likely have to be a state mandate, and while some states (CA) might be open to it, others (TX) likely won’t. You could try to force it through from a federal funding directive like they did with highway money and the drinking age being standard (drinking age is set by the state, they’ve just all been bribed by the feds to make it 21). But you’d get a lot of pushback from companies who would be losing millions+ every year on the requirement and we all know the outsized impact companies have on our money grubbing politicians.
So while I like you’re idea in principle I don’t think it’s realistic at all since youre wanting companies to do it voluntarily. It might be possible to force them to do it involuntarily but it would be a bitter, bloody fight and the populace would need to want it overwhelmingly which I don’t think would be the case. You’d have my vote in favor for what it’s worth.
It also ignores the big issue of distribution.
A Kroger is not equipped to handle distribution of food to those in need. And I will 100% guarantee you that if they just leave the dumpsters unlocked, it will mostly be upper middle class college kids “dumpster diving” who grab the food… until one of them gets stabbed and the entire program is shut down forever.
I would like to see more effort to work with local charities and food banks to donate food but… a surprising number of supermarkets already do that. The issue is that there just aren’t enough food banks because NIMBYs kill them out of fear it will lead to “too many homeless people. and poors”. Which gets back to the issue of trying to get food to centralized locations which increase costs, cause issues with food that is fine if it is kept refrigerated, etc.
Like, for as massively fucked as it is to see an entire aisle of cereal get thrown into a bin and the latch locked, that is not “the problem”. The problem is that we as a society do everything we can to make life inhospitable for the less well off in the hopes that they die and go away.
Yet! A Kroger isn not equipped to handle it yet. Work needs to be put into the idea, a plan will form, and then it can be executed.
I feel like too many people read idealistic future plans and assume it will be inmediate and therefore dismiss the idea entirely. Have hope :)
Retrofitting so many buildings and hiring out the staff, and training them, is just not viable. Or even a good idea. You might as well want all of them to have helicopter pads and hotels attached.
Food banks exist. There should be more of them. But they are a very different kind of building than a supermarket and you need a VERY different kind of staff to be able to actually help those who need it rather than wander off because you are getting paid minimum wage and its your smoke break.
That is a big leap to helicopter pads.
Rather than defeat the idea, why not try to think of ways it could work. Ideas need time to grow and flourish with revisions. Nothing is made perfectly the first time. What changes to the idea would you make in good faith?
Just because an idea won’t happen doesn’t mean we can’t explore the ‘what if’ :)
There isn’t much to retrofit. It could be like adding another pharmacy department counter.
There is no way this “could work” because it is a fundamentally bad idea.
A food bank is not just a cart full of loaves of bread. It involves people who know how to engage with various government programs and how to tell people how to engage with it. And, the good ones, involve people who know how to help the people who need to use said food bank.
Like I said above: the issue is not the food. It is the counties. It is getting people to allow a food bank to even exist in their county. And you can 100% bet that if it is such a struggle to allow one to be opened that they will not be cool with The Poors “shopping” in the same supermarket they do.
The issue is that you are approaching this from a REALLY shitty direction. Because the vast majority of the people losing their god damned minds over supermarkets dumping excess food? it isn’t the needy. It is college kids who decided they want to dumpster dive because that will let them save money on food to spend on weed. Because yes, supermarkets waste a LOT of food. But if you actually look into this at all from a “helping the needy” perspective, the issue isn’t the amount of food wasted (which generally isn’t actually THAT much because supermarkets would rather sell food than dump it) and more the distribution to the needy and actually having a food bank/shelter/soup kitchen in a given county/area. And distribution to the needy is almost universally stopped by NIMBYs
I hear your criticisms, but I also think you are not on the same page of understanding my idea as I am. It’s a shower thought anyways.
Also, distribution problem? The food is literally already there. Open something akin to the pharmacy counter area and a few staff could handle it.
Just for clarity, when you say staff you mean like government employees? Or charity workers?
Staff from the store itself. I see no barrier for a large business with m/billions in profit to add additional staff to run the food bank area.
To add a capitalist view: the food bank brings in people who might buy more. Yes, they are there to get food for survival, but the money saved might be spent on other goods like clothes or supplies in the store. (Stuff they need but wouldn’t be able to buy for food budget reasons).
So you’re not suggesting some sort of legal requirement? You want a company to voluntarily add labor cost, storage costs, any liability, equipment costs, etc on the chance people coming in for food assistance might buy stuff that not all grocery stores even carry?
Companies aren’t going to do that voluntarily, that’s not a realistic expectation. The ROI on your suggestion doesn’t make sense, the only way something like that gets staffed is if you convince states to pass some sort of requirement that companies do this…
This is an idea to flesh out. There are so many barriers. When you discover a problem, try to also find a solution instead of tossing it in the trash.
(Loss leaders are a thing too)
You may want to take your own advice, coming up with unrealistic solutions to every realistic problem posed to you isnt helpful either.
Loss leaders is a sales strategy that does not require additional overhead like permanent staffing, storage, and additional liability. Suggesting that they are makes it seem like you don’t understand sales, Operations, or logistics. I’m really trying to grasp how you think your “solutions” are helpful. Would you be comfortable providing insight into what industry you have the most experience in so that I can try to see it through the lens your looking at the problem through? (i.e. finance, customer service, procurement, etc).
Social work. I work in social work. I added loss leaders as a comment to provide context that stores make financial decisions that are a loss for the specific reason of getting more people to the store so they buy more. A food bank might be a loss that leads to more sales.
Ok. I got my “free food”, but maybe I want some ketchup for my potatoes too? I don’t mean to imply a foodbank will bring in net profits, but it can lessen the cost of running the bank.
Is a food store having a charity branch unrealistic?
Ok, that makes sense. Thanks for the work you do in a difficult field. But honestly I think you’re overly optimistic about a potential business case for this idea.
I apologize this is likely gonna be long.
Loss leaders are designed to pay for themselves over an average of other items bought so the store is never actually losing money. Some fast food places do this with food vs drinks. The cost to them for a drink is a few cents but they charge a couple dollars. That’s a 200%+ return in profit on the drinks which covers the cost of the drink and the margin of loss on the food plus some. Ketchup isn’t gonna do that. Things people might buy to supplement aren’t gonna do that. (If we were talking about lowering the cost of potatoes to get people to buy ketchup and condiments for them? maybe?) Labor is a huge expense, people cost more than their salary (401k, benefits, etc.) If someone makes $20K a company likely calculates their cost at $40K. So three full time employees to work the counter, work in back, etc is like $120,000 a year (assuming full time employees at $10 an hour) just in labor costs for 1 store. You would also need regional managers, lawyers, etc to run the program and they cost a lot more, plus the regionals travel expenses etc. Loss leaders at a grocery store isn’t gonna even dent that cost. Add to that the overhead for the building, storage, upkeep of the space. They might make some of it back on tax write-offs but why do all that when I can give $.25 off the profit on a can of beans to charity and write that off without the additional liability/cost of a food bank? I can give cash, write it off, and use it in my ads to appear less capitalist greedy oversteer. When I can use the space a food bank would take up to sell overpriced sugar? That’s lost opportunity cost on that floor space and that could cost $100,000+ a year depending on how much space the food bank would require. Per store. That’s millions a year for sure to get back? Not much from the companies perspective.
A charity branch? No. Food banks that they run out of every store? Yes. From a business perspective it doesn’t make any sense at all, that’s why you’ve never seen one even at more “progressive” grocery stores. A charity branch will make cash donations, set up “sales for charity” schemes, and do what some people have already commented and donate the food to local charities. All for that sweet sweet tax write off money. The logistics of that transfer with meat plus the additional liability is why you’re unlikely to see them donate it even if the food bank has a fridge. The issue is with getting it from the store to the food bank.
You’re getting a lot of pushback from people in this thread because your stance that a grocer would do this voluntarily is, in a business sense, wildly optimistic and bordering on absurd. The only real path I see towards this idea (which I do think is an ideal that’s worth striving towards) is if the government mandated it. The issue there (in the US, I’m US based and understand that system best) is that it would likely have to be a state mandate, and while some states (CA) might be open to it, others (TX) likely won’t. You could try to force it through from a federal funding directive like they did with highway money and the drinking age being standard (drinking age is set by the state, they’ve just all been bribed by the feds to make it 21). But you’d get a lot of pushback from companies who would be losing millions+ every year on the requirement and we all know the outsized impact companies have on our money grubbing politicians.
So while I like you’re idea in principle I don’t think it’s realistic at all since youre wanting companies to do it voluntarily. It might be possible to force them to do it involuntarily but it would be a bitter, bloody fight and the populace would need to want it overwhelmingly which I don’t think would be the case. You’d have my vote in favor for what it’s worth.