That's nothing.  Major chains switch to central planning all the time.  Just go into Walmart and ask them why they don't follow the local seasons like anyone with half a wit would do, instead of selling lawn mowers while the snow is still on the ground in the north, while waiting a month past the growing season in the south.

These monolithic dinosaurs for retail chains would mostly be gone or bought out by someone with half a wit if Uncle would get the fuck out of the market, but as long as you've got a few morons doing 50% of the sales, the warehouse is going to cater to morons.

The joys of Communism...

Clarification for the idiots.  The defining trait of Communism, as opposed to Socialism in general, is central planning.  Before any liberal shit tards go crazy, think about it and see if you can figure out how Walmart is copying the communists.  I'd love to point out all the communist and fascist aspects of the current president, as well as the previous, just not by hijacking his thread with the first reply.

Ironcally this system of centralized warehousing is a boon for UPS and FEDEX. We love to make money off those warehousing techniques

Wrong.  You don't have any sales for something that isn't stocked.  An idiot with an MBA that can't think his way out of a paper bag has never worked in a store.  No matter how many times you put in an order for the fastest selling tuna around, you'll never sell more than a single case if you can't get them to stock more than a single case.

Oatnut bread, never more than a loaf or two.  We're constantly having to buy some other bread because it's just not there.  Starkist solid light tuna filet in olive oil, usually only a few cans of it.  They actually had four cases of the stuff a few weeks ago, we bought an entire case ourselves, someone else there at the same time was pulling cans off the shelf like they were gold too.  They're back to not having any, so I'm guessing it was a distribution screw up.  I am supposed to be a pessimist though, so maybe after several years of just one family wanting nearly their entire stock they've figured it out.  This is when we go to the Walmart in the next town over too.  The local branch has niether the good tuna, nor the Oatnut bread.  They don't have Tetley Tea either, the wankers.  It's not a super center, so it gets dick for selection, thus everyone drives to the other one.

The numbers look perfect, they sell every can of that tuna that gets put on the shelf inside a week, but they only sell a case or two a month because most of the time there isn't any tuna to begin with.  When the managers put in requests for more, they get ignored, because central planning is going by wrong numbers instead of listening to the managers that get bitched at by annoyed customers running around two different towns trying to find a fucking can of tuna that isn't worse than cat food.

Edit:

Which is why Gamestop only makes money selling used video games.  I don't even bother looking at the pc game section when I'm already in Walmart for other reasons, it's not worth the effort.  Why the hell would I go to a specialty store with just as poor a selection or worse?

Sounds like you have crappy managers at either the store or the distribution center. I never noticed things we were consistently sold out of, and I remember several things we had sold out of a couple times only to majorly overstock a week later - the program is supposed to take rate of sale into consideration, so selling a whole case of something at once should wave a big red flag at someone.

Off hand, I can tell you that tuna was never a major seller in our store, but I never had to deal with the bread or tea. I still shudder at the thought of getting stuck facing the shelves in the canned meat aisle. Thank god most of my time was spent unloading trucks and moving large, heavy objects.

Ahh, memories. Ever heard someone take out an 8'x4' endcap display of light bulbs with 800 pounds of dog food? If he hadn't been the shift manager, he might have gotten in trouble for that.

Out of curiosity, when were you working at Wally World?  They're on a massive downward spiral right now for selection.  It wasn't even half as bad just a couple years ago.  The clothes section keeps expanding though...

Remember this when retailers whine that Internet<-Warehouse->Customer is destroying their businesses
Also, retailers aren't thrilled with the digital download system, as it cuts into their kool-aid, so to speak-- They don't overstock the shelves with Steam and Impulse games.

DrGonzo

I quit about 4 years ago, when I got my current job. I still have two friends who work in the optical department, both of which make more money than I do now.

The problem with that view is that you end up with lots of redundant people. The purpose of efficiency and productivity improvements is to maintain or improve service while reducing payroll. Just to put numbers on it: my Walmart had about 150 people working there. Your expert comes in and streamlines processes, rearranges duty assignments, etc and makes the store capable of running at the same or higher service level with 120 people, what is the point of keeping 30 people around doing nothing, when their jobs are being handled by the other 120 people?