I don't even want a card. Name or phone number or I just don't use their "rewards" program.
this post was submitted on 15 Dec 2023
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My idea was to make customers use a sturdy bag instead of one-use plastic ones.
Then just stop having single use bags. No need to be annoying AF by forcing them into one alternative that sounds janky anyway.
What makes it sound janky?
Having to get a scanner to read a chip in a huge bag would be cumbersome as hell.
As it doesn't exist yet, we can imagine anything. Like thesr chips being in handles for example.
Which would be cumbersome.
I would've loved to have me and you being managers of the same shop in neighboring districts to test it and see if I'm wrong.
It doesn't take a real world test to know you're wrong. It's as simple as thinking about it for a couple minutes. It's a solution to a problem that doesn't exist. Having the chip built into a bag means they have to scan the bag which means they have to orient a bag around to get it positioned correctly for scanning. This is objectively more difficult than using a card.
Also, you now have to deal with all the problems that come with bags if the chip is built into the bag you have to use THAT bag for that store. You can't find a bag, crate, whatever that is to your liking and use it when you go shopping. You have to carry the specific bag for the specific store you are going into instead of getting one that you use everywhere which means having a bunch of different bags for all the stores you go to. If the bag is damaged you now have to get an entirely new bag instead of just a replacement card. If you live with other people that also have their own memberships then you will have to keep even more bags around.
In spite of your adamant conclusion, I would've liked this being tested. In a fashion of some Discovery Channel's older programs. The battle royale of marketing practices.
Having the design of this bag, the check out zone, the cart under control, one can dictate how it would work. You can even place it on the bottom and have it automatically scanned as it rolls through a checkout table. Or, if it stays in a cart (and you can adjust it to be 1:1 to cart size), a chip on the side can also be read by the scanner on a side of said table. So many variants.
I don't see how it's more confusing than having all these loyalty cards. If it's a general store like Walmart, Auchan you visit daily (or weekly) and buy most things here, it's not really a problem. If they are freely interchangeable and have just one tier of price-cutting (like my cards in a local Lenta general store do), you don't need bags for every person in your household, you can bring any one at hand.
And it should be build at expense of the store and have a symbolic price, say $1, but being alike to IKEA ones - those I pick with myself everywhere by choice because I know they would carry 30kg of groceries if I'd need that. This investment into loyalty of returning customers and having brand being associated with zero waste wouldn't be for nothing. If it's not a metropolitan area, but a rural one, I think these bags would be, just like Xerox, a new coloquial naming to all good bags one encounter. They'd carry your ad everywhere, and everyone would know it's from Your-Store. And having that thing at hand promising you better prices at Your-Store, you'd probably come here, not to Other-Store.
This is a really good idea!! I wish big corporations gave any amount of thought to not destroying the planet, this probably would be popular already if they did.
IKEA makes good sturdy bags already, I think other brands can see a benefit in doing so too.
My experience with shopping in California, they make the plastic bags (that you have to pay for) pretty sturdy so you can reuse them. At least at Target.
The issue with this though is people still litter these bags and being thicker plastic theyre even worse.
The downside for them would be that families share bags, but carry cards in personal wallets
If they want to data mine purchases, they might want it on the individual level
Hmm, I wonder what they think of me using my sister's phone number for some places, and the last land line I had in others?
Yeah, jokes on them - I use my ex’s number. She buys the craziest stuff
I try to keep 2 bags in my car and the rest in my house, that way I have enough with me for a quick unplanned stop but don't need to flood my car with bags. With this system I'd need to have 1 bag per store and make sure to always have all of them in my car to avoid not getting points/discounts? Current system where you just use whichever bags and don't need to worry about what store they originally came from seems simpler.
This is kinda brilliant.
In the EU single use bags cannot be sold anymore, so everyone now has some of what they call "bag for life". It's a similar material to the blue IKEA bags (if that's a thing in the USA).
They last really long and since the material requirements are basic as can be, they are usually made out of 100% recycled plastic.
Just FYI, Americans do have the massive blue IKEA bags, with yellow handles I think. I remember seeing the reverse color scheme, yellow bag with blue handles, on a couple of bags when the IKEA opened in my town.
Thanks! Seems to be the same worldwide. Over here the blue ones are for sale, the yellow ones are for use inside the IKEA.
That's why I love them so much.
My idea is about further benefit the bag holders.
My country is head deep in single-use plastics right now and only a minority uses these cool bags.
Was the same here before they were banned.
All big stores here sell sturdy bags for like $2 that will last for over a year. My oldest one is like 5 years old at this point and it still works great.
It's just a little push to have these with you every time.
Collapsible Crates from Costco replaced my reusable cloth shopping bags.
Easier for me, albeit heavier than smaller bags would be.
What would the chip contain? Storing your credit card information on a bag? And then you have to somehow tap that chip against a reader when it's full of your contents?
It would just need to be the discount card/clubcard. Just a user id number. The payment can be separate.
You are right. Just a club card code. The only exception - is that it shouldn't have an obvious way to add it to one's NFC cards app in order to keep most having these bags.
I think they're saying discount card#, not credit card. Like at CVS. And I assume they could put an NFC reader in the checkout scanner so you could just drag the full bag across it to read the code