It is definately a fact. Each CUB store sets it's own prices for items (except the advertised sales ones). One of the services we provided from SuperValu to CUB managers was data processing reports to help them in setting prices at their store. It is one of the most important decisions a store manager makes.>> If you were to compare prices in an inner city Cub Food store verses >> one in the suburbs, you would find the inner city store has higher >> prices. >> Steve Kotvis said: I wonder if this an empirical fact or a perception?
Not so. Steady unionized jobs in a clean, well-lighted, air-conditioned store are highly sought after in 'poor neighborhoods'. They usually have a lot of applicants for each opening.For example, they might find it more difficult to attract and or retain labor.
Operating 24 hours costs a CUB store almost nothing. They have to have people there at night anyway, restocking shelves, cleaning, etc.; also many of their deliveries are at night (less traffic to obstruct the big trucks) so they need people there to receive deliveries. Hiring a few cashiers to work the registers at night is all that is needed, and that's a pretty minor expense.Or they cannot economically justify operating 24 hours so their operational cost structure is more expensive.
Also, people in 'poor neighborhoods' are often more likely to work shifts with odd hours, so they do take advantage of the open-24-hours policy.
There's a lot of potential reasons.A major one, not mentioned so far, is that stores in 'poor neighborhoods' have a much higher ratio of theft & vandalism losses. That is, people who wander around the store eating & drinking things they have taken off the shelves. Or people who decide not to buy something they (or their kids) have put into the cart, and so instead of putting it back where they got it they just dump it on the nearest shelf. Often these are spoiled because of that, and are a loss to the store. This happens a lot more in some stores than others, and the store has to raise prices to cover this.
Tim Bonham, Ward 12, Standish-Ericsson
(former SuperValu employee)
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