(Nantes) Every morning at 9 a.m. sharp, Gisèle, 72, “cheats loneliness” at the checkout of a hypermarket in the Nantes conurbation, in the west of France. She always chooses the “blah blah checkout”, intended for customers who are talkative or not in a hurry.
Posted at 7:00 a.m.
In front of the counter, a blue sign marked “Here we take our time” invites talkative customers…. and warns the impatient.
“I’m talking about the rain, the good weather, my grandchildren arriving for the holidays,” explains the retiree, dressed in an elegant navy blue jacket.
Outside of school vacation periods, Gisèle’s daily outing to a Hyper U store is often her only opportunity to “see people” during the day. So she “makes herself beautiful” before going there.
“I had a bridge club, but with COVID-19 I don’t really want to go there anymore,” she says.
Behind her checkout counter, Rozenn Charpentier, 52, scans products on the chain while chatting with a customer in her sixties, annoyed at having “still taken a PV” when she was ” not so badly parked”.
Then check out a perky 60-year-old who has just won “150 Bullets at the Millionaire”, a scratch game, and two teenagers in parkas who are playing ball guns, all smiles. “Be careful anyway,” the hostess slips in to them.
Social link
“At the ‘blah blah box’ I allow myself to engage in conversation. Customers who pass by generally like it, ”says Rozenn Charpentier, bright pink uniform jacket.
Like her, all the hostesses of the “blah blah box” are volunteers and take turns to keep it running throughout the day.
Opposite to the six automatic checkouts, the “slow checkout” was opened just two years ago to “re-establish a close link” with all customers, explains Régis Défontaine, communication and animation manager of the Hyper U.
“Exchanges between customers and merchants? We didn’t invent anything. But today there is a social bond that is being lost and some regret it. It’s not Amazon here, ”said the young man with a smile.
In fact, he acknowledges, this fund is especially popular with older people, who are more isolated and less in a hurry.
The same system exists in other brands, such as Auchan and Carrefour, of which 150 hypermarkets are now equipped with “blah blah blah checkouts”. The system was generalized in January.
“This responds to an expectation of certain customers who prefer to take their time, discuss”, specifies Pierre-Emmanuel Vasseur, director of a Carrefour in the region of Angers, some 90 kilometers east of Nantes, who says not target a particular audience.
” Smooth talker ”
His new fund opened barely a week ago. In the queue, some customers are wondering.
“What should we talk about? asks a man in his sixties, well-groomed white hair and an ironed shirt. “Is there a time limit? », Launches an enthusiastic client.
“You are charming, since you have to chat,” slips a man to the young cashier.
Behind him, a customer hesitates in front of the sign indicating the “blah blah blah checkout”. “I’m not a smooth talker,” he mutters before pushing his cart to another counter.
Here too, the new fund is a hit with seniors.
Marie-Luc Lefeuvre-Justeau, 82, “chatters in the shops”, out of politeness and “to distract herself”. “But there are always people in a hurry to complain. Here, we don’t bother anyone. »