Op-Ed: The grocery chain wars prove that the modern supermarket model isn’t sustainable
When you walk into the grocery store, you’re greeted with a smiling couple holding hands while shopping for the couple’s first grandchild.
That’s the picture you’ll be seeing of grocery stores on a typical day. They’re usually full of smiling, friendly people and families with their kids running around the store, playing games of tag, rolling around in shopping carts, or just kicking back and enjoying the fresh produce and the delicious delights.
They’re busy! They’re crowded! It’s a crowded store!
This is the model of the modern grocery store.
But it’s not a model that works today.
That’s what I’d like to tell you today.
I want to share with you why the grocery model isn’t sustainable. Why the old model isn’t working for us anymore. Why the new model is a disaster.
Let me begin.
The history of convenience
For the longest time, the grocery store was the center of our life. We shopped in grocery stores for food, drinks, clothing, and other necessities. We shopped in grocery stores for entertainment, convenience, and for social interaction.
Grocery stores became the center of our social life, and we often spent our entire day in them.
But that wasn’t always the case.
For a long time, grocery stores were little more than a source of convenience and gathering places for people. The store became one great social gathering spot, rather than an important source of sustenance.
Grocery stores are where we sat down and ate. In fact, it wasn’t until this past century that grocery stores started to become more than the great gathering spaces they once were. The stores started to become where we ate, the stores where we shopped, and the stores that we gathered
