Wash, Rinse, and Hang Out to Dry

CAUTION: Long rant to follow...

We were at Fred Meyer last night picking up rice milk and Newman O's, (the minty one are truly addicting). If you've ever been to Freddy's, you know that more common than not, there are like 52 check stands and a "U-SCAN". Usually of those 52 stands, only 2 or 3 are ever open and if you are there when it's busy, the lines are ridiculous. The U-SCAN is where you check your own groceries through. It goes something like this: scan item, wait for computer to beep, place item in bag, oops, item didn't scan, try again, then try again, oh that's beer, wait for guy to come over and check your ID, then place in bag, scan next item. Oh, wait, it's produce... place on scale, input proper code, oh, that code doesn't work. Call Dude over again and wait for him to find code for your apples and so it goes. On and on. You get the idea. Meanwhile, all of the people in the other lanes are out in their cars getting on with their lives. I don't know about you, but when I go to the market I figure part of the price I pay is for the service I get there and checking and bagging my own groceries doesn't really feel like sevice. Call me crazy.

So, we are wondering around looking for the check stand with the little light on telling us the lane is open, and Scotty walks right by and starts to head for the U-SCAN. I'm thinking this is really weird because I know he hates the U-SCAN. I grab him and turn back to the open lane and find a very young man with a bewildered look on his face sort of ready to help us. He makes a comment about us not using the U-SCAN. He says that it really get easier once you learn how to use it, (as if we were to stupid to figure it out.) He wasn't being mean though. He was just doing his job. Spewing the company line. I asked if he was worried that he would have nothing to do if we had decided not to come through his line. In my mind I'm thinking that paying people to do customer service when there are no customers really isn't in the spirit of how large corporations do business. He assured us that that they still need people to man the U-SCAN station, but here's the rub - it was his boss at the U-SCAN.

The brain washing of America has become so complete that even grocery store clerks are willing to encourage customers to take advantage of a situation that makes their very job obsolete. Corporate America is winning! At some point we, the consumer, will never have to make contact with a single soul, whether we are going the movies, the grocery store, the gas station, or any number of fully automated establishments. These jobs are becoming irrevelant and human contact is on it's way to extinction. We are on our way to having a country filled with unemployed freaks. I mean really, human contact is what makes us care about other people and make the right decisions where others are concerned.

This is going to sound corny but Howard Shultz of Starbucks says, "We are NOT in the coffee business serving people, we are in the people business serving coffee." And he still manages to rake in crap loads of money. Hmm... I hope that technology in the future will make my job easier and free up more of my time so I can spend it with my employees and my customers. Hopefully, it won't make what I do worthless to the people who pay me to do it.