Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 92.djvu/225

 You Run This Store Yourself

��But there is a cashier at the door

��IN these days of conservation, it is very appropriate that a new grocery store — a wasteless grocery store — has made its appearance. It is the invention of Clarence Saunders of Memphis, Tenn. The grocery which Mr. Saunders has patented, lowers the cost of operation for its owner and lowers the cost of food for the consumer. Saun ders' grocery runs it- self. There are no clerks. When you go into the store you enter a turnstile, pick up a basket and are free to do your shop- ping without any interfer- ence. No po- lite clerk persuades you to purchase something you don't want. Every article is labeled plainly and displayed on the counters in such a manner that you sim- ply help yourself. You make your selec- tions in your own way.

���plan showing how the first grocery store

��The aisles are so arranged that you progress through the store in a given di- rection. When you come out, you find yourself opposite a checking and settle- ment counter. A clerk checks ofiF your purchases and you pay him for what you have taken. If you have made no pur- chases, you simply pass out.

Naturally the overhead expenses are much less in a store of this character than they would be if a staff of clerks was kept in attendance. The waste is much less than it is in the average gro- cery store. In weighing food hurriedly there is often a loss of a little of the substance being weighed, as well as the danger of the weight being over or under the de- sired amount. When the material is weighed without hurry or anxiety, the results are more satisfactory.

��customers enter and leave which ever was patented

���The customers select their own groceries and carry them to the checking counter where they are paid for. The customers then wrap up their packages and carry them home

209

�� �