Rolling Blackouts & the Effects on Retail

This is the place for general and miscellaneous posts on topics which might extend past the boundaries of any specific region. No non-grocery posts.
storewanderer
Posts: 14396
Joined: February 23rd, 2009, 3:54 pm
Has thanked: 2 times
Been thanked: 298 times
Contact:
Status: Offline

Re: Rolling Blackouts & the Effects on Retail

Post by storewanderer »

I went into a Dollar Tree last night and while it looked closed due to having half of its lights out, it was actually open. No store hours posted on the doors and hardly any customers there (usually this is pretty busy). Even the checkstand open light was not turned on (employee was standing there the whole time though).

We were notified in Reno to limit power usage from 3 PM to 9 PM and that there was a risk of blackouts.
pseudo3d
Posts: 3853
Joined: November 12th, 2015, 7:01 pm
Has thanked: 5 times
Been thanked: 77 times
Status: Offline

Re: Rolling Blackouts Hit California For First Time Since 2011

Post by pseudo3d »

storewanderer wrote: August 16th, 2020, 8:56 pm
pseudo3d wrote: August 16th, 2020, 1:32 pm
Albertsons did back in 2001, and the knucklehead who ran Albertsons at the time decided to extend it to all the Albertsons stores for a time, making stores that were already struggling against competition even worse by making the store dark and dreary.
The dark Safeway lifestyle stores accomplished a similar effort to reduce lighting usage with the dark lights around the perimeter.
Was it really about lighting usage? I thought the whole idea behind Lifestyle was an attempt to make the stores more "upscale" to stand out against the competition, which was justified as their acquired divisions were struggling by that point. (I might be able to pull some articles to support that).

Also, it's hard to do this just on text but assume I did air quotes with the word "upscale". ;)
storewanderer
Posts: 14396
Joined: February 23rd, 2009, 3:54 pm
Has thanked: 2 times
Been thanked: 298 times
Contact:
Status: Offline

Re: Rolling Blackouts Hit California For First Time Since 2011

Post by storewanderer »

pseudo3d wrote: August 20th, 2020, 3:51 am
Was it really about lighting usage? I thought the whole idea behind Lifestyle was an attempt to make the stores more "upscale" to stand out against the competition, which was justified as their acquired divisions were struggling by that point. (I might be able to pull some articles to support that).

Also, it's hard to do this just on text but assume I did air quotes with the word "upscale". ;)
It is part of the ROI. You do a remodel and reduce light usage and that reduced expense is part of your ROI analysis for the remodel. Similar to when you pull out 30 year old refrigeration and install new more energy efficient refrigeration, same type of idea there is an ROI study done to see how the numbers work out. Remember Steve Burd was an expert at expense control. The mood lighting may have accomplished a more upscale look but it also accomplished an expense cut on power usage.

The new lights Albertsons has installed look painful- it hurts my eyes when I walk into the local stores with the "lighting upgrade" as they only did it around the perimeter and kept the old Safeway brighter lights in the grocery aisles.
klkla
Posts: 1614
Joined: February 24th, 2009, 3:26 pm
Been thanked: 2 times
Status: Offline

Re: Rolling Blackouts Hit California For First Time Since 2011

Post by klkla »

pseudo3d wrote: August 16th, 2020, 1:32 pm Albertsons did back in 2001, and the knucklehead who ran Albertsons at the time decided to extend it to all the Albertsons stores for a time, making stores that were already struggling against competition even worse by making the store dark and dreary.
The problem then was bigger than just turning lights off. Like any organization... whether it be a company, government or other entity... is that if you put a leader in charge that has no relative experience in that industry or field, who failed as a leader in whatever that person was doing before, and has no common sense... they will fail and take everyone else down with them.

Such was the case with Albertson's in the early 2000's. They appointed a CEO who didn't have an impressive track record when he was with his former employer, knew nothing about the industry and was clueless about what to do. He got played by adversaries (IE: SoCal strike that was part of Safeway's strategy that they were not planning for). I remember shopping in their stores in that era. The stores were dark and dirty. Managers only scheduled properly for the time when they were actually there because there was no supervision from corporate. At night there would only be one cashier and lines to the back of the store. Remember, it was so bad they decided to break up the company because they didn't know how to fix it.
TW-Upstate NY
Shift Manager
Shift Manager
Posts: 421
Joined: May 11th, 2009, 6:09 pm
Been thanked: 4 times
Status: Offline

Re: Rolling Blackouts Hit California For First Time Since 2011

Post by TW-Upstate NY »

klkla wrote: August 20th, 2020, 8:51 pm Such was the case with Albertson's in the early 2000's. They appointed a CEO who didn't have an impressive track record when he was with his former employer, knew nothing about the industry and was clueless about what to do.
Now let's be fair here-I mean the guy came from a company that sold light bulbs so maybe they figured that was enough :mrgreen:
storewanderer
Posts: 14396
Joined: February 23rd, 2009, 3:54 pm
Has thanked: 2 times
Been thanked: 298 times
Contact:
Status: Offline

Re: Rolling Blackouts Hit California For First Time Since 2011

Post by storewanderer »

klkla wrote: August 20th, 2020, 8:51 pm
Such was the case with Albertson's in the early 2000's. They appointed a CEO who didn't have an impressive track record when he was with his former employer, knew nothing about the industry and was clueless about what to do. He got played by adversaries (IE: SoCal strike that was part of Safeway's strategy that they were not planning for). I remember shopping in their stores in that era. The stores were dark and dirty. Managers only scheduled properly for the time when they were actually there because there was no supervision from corporate. At night there would only be one cashier and lines to the back of the store. Remember, it was so bad they decided to break up the company because they didn't know how to fix it.
I actually thought the Albertsons run by Larry was better than the Albertsons run by Supervalu... both were pretty bad.

At the time the people at Albertsons were justifying the hire of a non-grocery executive by saying these executives are trained to be able to manage effectively across industries. It didn't help that the CEO before Larry also did not make the right strategic moves with the chain.
User avatar
submariner
Founder of RetailWatchers.com
Founder of RetailWatchers.com
Posts: 571
Joined: February 22nd, 2009, 10:35 am
Location: Canberra, ACT, Australia
Has thanked: 5 times
Been thanked: 24 times
Contact:
Status: Offline

Re: Rolling Blackouts & the Effects on Retail

Post by submariner »

Straying off topic...
Post Reply