Giant Gaffe

It's the holidays. So why give your customers any reason to wish they were somewhere else?

The Giant superstore in Kelana Jaya must have about twenty check-out counters. This evening, the fourth day of Hari Raya, there were barely three counters opened.

The queues were snaking like an ants on a sugar grab.

Of course everyone knows the store's (mainly) Muslim workforce was depleted. Everyone, however, wouldn't care - not when they have to wait half an hour to pay for their groceries.

Giant has been opened for many years. And this isn't the first staff-diminishing holiday it's endured. So it's unfortunate that no real planning was done to anticipate and address this problem via, maybe:

• giving the waiting customers a 10$ coupon for their patience (so what? at least you'll guarantee they'll come back and positively word-of-mouth you)
• enforcing a '10 items of less' rule for peak holiday hours (if they want to buy more, they'll need to line-up twice/thrice, sorry)
• minimizing the staff-force in other areas and channel them to the counters (I swear I saw at least two or three staff hanging around not doing much...)
• closing the place for a day or two! (no one will blame ya; I think this is the option most stores in Singapore take during hols)
• request more staff to stay back (I personally don't like to see junior staff missing out on the holidays, but somehow Giant could find people to man the fruit, the meat, the packaging sections - what's up with the cashiers?)

Still, well...I guess it's always easier to make the customers wait...and wait...and wait.