I know in Japan for instance, there’s a unmanned store where you can buy things with the only thing meeting you near the front entrance & exit is self checkout. It’s a trust based system where you walk in select what you want (without locking any essential or mundane item behind plexiglass), as in they depend on individuals having common sense on not stealing paying via a “honesty box” based on a honor system.
I’m a retail manager. I’ve managed a lot of places.
One thing I’ve always said is “we could probably leave a bucket here for everyone to pay as they left. 9 out of ten people would be honest, the tenth tho would take the whole bucket.”
I don’t think it would work in America. Also with current events I no longer feel 9 of the ten would be trustworthy anymore.
In many ways a vending machine is precisely that.
(without locking any essential or mundane item behind plexiglass)
not really
This worked pretty well with farms/co-ops in Vermont. Everyone had a stand. You could also leave a IOU if you didn’t bring enough coin. Then again this was a town of like 600-700 people. When I phrase it like that, I mean people would pull over and give you a ride to where you’re going. Everybody knew everyone. 🙃
Vending machines.
You’re looking for a vending machine.
I suppose statistically it would work - the lowest rank in the Honest Tea trial was 80% honest in DC… but then they stole his bike too.
https://wtop.com/news/2013/07/dc-proves-its-dishonesty-to-honest-tea/
The problem is they tried this in DC
That’s so stereotypical, and attempting to correlate this data with demographics is straight up refused by the AI agents I’ve tried lmao
Doubtful, IME Americans lack honor and respect at a significantly higher rate than other countries.
If there are desperate unhappy people it will probably not go well. Our society produces a lot of desperate, unhappy, people.
And then there are those that are just assholes, and think that someone who trusts their fellow Citizens like that should be taught a harsh lesson.
In my area there are people with farms who have a kiosk at the end of their road where they stock what they have available — eggs, flowers, cheese, pottery, etc. and a suggested price list, plus a secure drop box.
Seems to work out OK for them. Not sure I’d want to try that in a more populated area, but I HAVE also seen neighborhood libraries in urban areas that seem to survive (box at the end of the walk containing books to share; you can take a book and return it to any of the boxes in the area, and are encouraged to add new ones).
I saw one in China almost a decade ago. QR code in at the door and grab whatever you need, your account gets charged with whatever you take. Wasn’t very big, maybe 4m X 4m. Had cold drinks and snacks. Was more a gimmick for me than something I would search out to actively use.
Yes. You’re likely to see one at a busy airport.
You get in by presenting a form of payment. You take what you want and walk out. You get charged for it.
The concept works, but only when labor costs are extremely high. Right now, that seems to be only airports.
I’ve seen this in airports behind security. It may work in a small, everyone literally knows everyone else, town but I don’t think it would work anywhere else.
I’ve seen similar in Canada (though not fully public), but never saw anything like that in ~25yrs in the US. I think US culture is too greedy for it.
I’ve seen some unattended stores in the US, kinda. There’s a person there, but they don’t ring people up full time. Usually they’re cleaning or stocking. There’s no honor system, a machine visually scans and weighs your items and rings you up that way. The person only gets involved if they need to check your ID for alcohol sales or if there’s an error with the machine.
you would have to put them in a vending machine style setup, so it cant be stolen right off the bat.
Won’t work in most cities.
This is common enough in very small towns not on main highways, though, where everyone knows everyone, and many of them are relatives.
I imagine in mob-controlled neighborhoods, in cities, where everyone knows who owns the store and no one would dare steal from it, it would work. But, that might be fiction.
