tinfins

That's exactly the reason for this policy. One of many reasons, actually.

But it actually is meant for things on regular shelves, it doesn't apply to the produce department, which is what all the pictures in this terrible article show. It also doesn't apply if the product is going to be out-of-stock for a known period of time. It's meant for situations where the buyer didn't order enough and it will only be out for a day or two.

I jumped ahead there and left a step of my reasoning out. The article describes a lack of backstock, due to OTS, causing out-of-stocks when stores have to miss a delivery or two. But if you assume that the vast majority of these issues were in fact caused by unpredictable events, then the only possible solution would be to keep large amounts of extra stock at all times, which is worse for the customer and the company in the end. Obviously the goal is for neither extreme to occur.

The article is wrong about the regularity of the issue, the "weird control systems" (not sure what connection you're seeing with employee protection laws), and the causes.

But you misunderstand me if you think I'm burying my head in the sand. I don't deny that Whole Foods has issues with its ordering processes. In fact, I think the company has been going in the wrong direction there for a long time. The article is just so, so off-base - originally I didn't intend to argue with it, but now I've become this guy: https://xkcd.com/386/

It will be interesting to see if Amazon can improve the situation through automation. Generally I've seen stores that use automated ordering systems be far worse with their out-of-stocks (Kroger, for instance).

Yeah, I wonder. We definitely aren't used to all the media attention - honestly, I got a little carried away in the comments here.

I wouldn't say I even particularly care about Whole Foods' reputation, it's more the false narrative that bothered me and I just happened to know how wrong it was. Must be so much worse for employees at the big tech companies or others that are in the news all the time.

You wouldn't want backstock for produce of more than a day or two, because that's going to reduce freshness. You can't just constantly keep tons of backstock of everything year-round just in case there's a storm one week.

Also, OTS allows backstock of top selling items or in emergencies. If you can predict a big storm like what probably caused most of the problems in the article, you are allowed to stock up on product.

That's why I have a problem with the article, it's just so factually incorrect.

OTS is really just a collection of pretty common-sense guidelines like don't have more than a certain percentage of inventory in backstock, don't have backstock of stuff that doesn't sell well, keep your backstock organized, etc.

There are a few details about it that can be irritating, but the comments from employees in the article are extremely misleading. If they're having a hard time passing their inspections it's because they're doing something very wrong - no one is failing an inspection for having 1 box facing the wrong way like it says in the article.

Not necessarily, I'm saying that even if there is, the article has no clue why.

Good point, but I'm not necessarily disagreeing that there were a few days with high out-of-stocks, just that the employees criticizing the OTS system in the article are being very misleading and exaggerating.

Most meat teams at WFM don't have overnight crews.

The thing is too, it's a snapshot. We don't know how long it looked like that, what time of the day it was, whether someone called out sick, etc.

So you think stores should just keep a huge backstock of fresh produce just in case an extreme weather event or some other rare issue hits? That's going to lead to less fresh produce for the 350 days a year when everything goes smoothly.

The OTS system in the article also allows for exceptions - if there were bananas available the store could have stocked up on them. It's just so wrong on many levels - I could spend all day pointing them out, but this thread is getting bigger than I thought and I don't know if I can spend much more time on it. I was going to edit my original comment with more information but it doesn't look like I can anymore.

There's no centralized replenishment system yet at Whole Foods, OTS is just a collection of guidelines enforced by inspections. 99% of ordering is done manually at the store level for now.

I took another look at the pictures. Notice all those stores where whole sections are out are in the Northeast. Probably they missed a delivery or two because of the weather. Plus during extreme weather grocery stores get shopped hard.

There was one picture of an empty banana set with a pineapple in the wrong spot - that's what I was referring to before.

The sole picture in San Francisco was the reset I mentioned.

I don't find it hard to believe that a few stores ran out of bananas or whatever for a day. That's all it would take for a customer to snap a picture. The picture of a meat department cooler with empty slide racks was obviously in the middle of a reset - notice the lack of price tags on all the racks because they were just installed.

I'll add some more info in a few hours.

I gave my opinion on the causes elsewhere in the comments.

Ah, I missed that, sorry.

There are a few things that happen every New Year that combine to contribute to shortages:

- Distributors have changed delivery schedules to work around New Year's Eve and Day.

- There's a large increase in demand for produce and some other ingredients (resolutions)

- Employees at the store and regional level take a few more vacations than usual, since we aren't able to during much of the holiday season. People also tend to plan the hell out of ordering for Thanksgiving and Christmas, but relax too much by New Year's since they figure crunch time is over. This is made worse by the relatively short tenures of most store buyers, since they either move up or quit relatively quickly.

So I would say there probably was a nationwide spike in out-of-stocks spread out over a few days. But it isn't really because of OTS.

I'm a Whole Foods employee, having one of those rare (for me) moments where I can reasonably be considered very well-informed on the subject of a news article, and it's a little bit disturbing just how misinformed and one-sided the article is.

The author seems to have talked with 10-20 disgruntled employees at a few stores nationwide, and a few customers on top of that. Maybe she should have reached out to Whole Foods corporate and asked for comments?

About the only thing she did get right was that Amazon isn't behind this. They haven't really messed with our supply chains much yet.

My assertion is supported though. Google tank man video.

I was talking about tank man...

Your assumption was the correct one.

No, I just thought it was interesting that the man in that iconic photo wasn't actually crushed. I hadn't realized until I saw the video.

I mean, I guess they could have crushed him later. But you can watch the video - he wasn't crushed after standing in front of the tank in the iconic photo.

You're wrong. Look at the comments below - you're reacting emotionally and not doing your research properly. I apologize if I'm mistaken, but I'm guessing you're Chinese. I've seen a lot of Chinese people get defensive over little things like this and respond with knee-jerk attacks, but it's really unnecessary. As your country gains influence worldwide you'll only see more articles like this - best get used to it and try to respond in a more useful way.

How do you think they should do that, and why are you responding so defensively? It seems to me that the only way for them to build up credibility is to never repeat the mistake they made last decade - but you seem to think that they should respond to their mistake by ... never downgrading a credit rating despite seeing issues? That doesn't make sense.

Tank man wasn't crushed, FYI.

Wow, that was incredibly well-written. It reads like good horror. I wasn't planning on reading any longer articles but couldn't help myself.

Yeah, I think one of the plastic containers of arugula was $.50 cheaper. But it's the organic one, so it depends on whether you normally buy that kind.

Vine-ripened tomatoes were cut by $1/lb at my store (from $2.99 to $1.99). The bulk rices all dropped, but I don't remember by how much.

Canned beans were already pretty competitive, don't think any dried ones changed. No change on onions, leeks, beets, pork, or bread that I noticed. Tilapia went down by a couple bucks a pound.

That's not true at all - the price cuts were to staples like salmon, avocados, ground beef, milk, eggs, bananas, etc...