Thank you Woolworth

Not just for the Icee beverages that made going to the mall much more palatable as a toddler but also for coming up with the idea of allowing costumers direct access to products. None of this behind the counter, pointing at what you want businesses.

I'm listening to a Planet Money podcast about failures in New York and they are passing the Woolworth building. The guest mentions that Woolworth was the first company to have what is commonplace today; aisles of goods that a costumer can pick up and touch and put into his or her basket. Before this practice, everything was behind a counter.

One of my guiltiest pleasures in Ukraine is supermarkets and chain stores in the major cities. I love the freedom of browsing instead of my process in the village where behind-the-counter is the norm. In the village, I never go into a store without a mental list of what I want, making sure that I ask for what I want in an order that causes the least amount of movement from shelf to shelf for the employee because otherwise I'll get grunts and flat out "net"s if it's too much of a trouble to serve me. Luckily people know that I'm a guest and look after me, but on occasion it doesn't work out as planned. I especially hate this process when it comes to buying perishable goods. I can't tell you how many times I've bought spoiled yogurt because I can't handle the container until after I've paid for it.

Okay, back to being slightly productive.