How Piggly Wiggly Reinvented The Grocery

They also serve who stand and wait

1916. Grocery shopping was a tedious errand.

Customers walked in and queued up at the counter. Reluctantly. When their turn came, they reeled off the items they needed. Or presented a handwritten list. To one of the sales clerks.

Who then dashed from shelf to shelf. Assembling the items from around the store. Scooping out loose items from barrels. Like wheat, cornmeal and sugar. Measuring or weighing them.

And rushed back to the cash register. Where impatient customers stood twiddling their thumbs.

The clerk then wrapped the goods. Stuffed them into bags. Totalled up the prices. Took payment.

And saw the customer off. Before moving on to the next in line.

The wait was agonising during peak hours.

Safe to say nobody found this chore exciting.

Cometh the hour, cometh the man

Clarence Saunders, a grocery professional, found this mundane routine a time killer. And store clerks an overhead. When footfalls were few.

He conjured up an alternative. Unheard of at the time.

Going against the grain

Saunders would convince American shoppers to serve themselves! And to carry their own merchandise around!

This atrocious idea made him a laughing stock. Among veteran grocers around town. Who were cynical. And willing to bet it would flop.

Teaser taglines

Thick-skinned Saunders announced his first customer self-service outlet. At 79 Jefferson. A busy commercial locality. In downtown Memphis, Tennessee. He named it "Piggly Wiggly". Really!

Press ads and hoardings cropped up. Ahead of the inauguration. Promising shoppers a whole new experience.

"Mrs Brown asked Mr Brown to stop by the Piggly Wiggly. On the way home."

"Piggly Wiggly ... ain't that a funny name? The fellow that got up that name must have a screw loose somewheres."

The moment of truth

September 6, 1916

Pre-launch media hype had done its job. Of pulling in the crowd.

Curious visitors flocked to the grand opening. The mood was festive. Piggly Wiggly staff sold 487 entry tickets that day!

Saunders greeted every customer at the door. In person.

The store interior looked out of this world.

1,125 square feet in area. A front lobby. A rear stock room.

And a brightly lit sales department in the middle. With a deliberately circuitous one-way floor plan.

There were no clerks attending!

A few smartly attired employees were busy stocking shelves, of course. But they courteously declined to fetch items. Or to fill orders for customers.

Treasure hunt?

Customers entered the store through a turnstile. Grabbed a wicker basket. Never mind that it cost three cents to rent.

And followed the arrows. To four numbered aisles.

Where staff had assorted 601 items. Into neat numbered sections. Canned soups. Muffin batters. Strawberry preserves. Body lotions. And the like.

Every single item had its price marked.

So that buyers would know exactly what they'd be paying. After all, there were no clerks to consult.

And so that they could compare two brands alongside each other. At their own pace. With nobody to hurry them.

A double-sided refrigerated cabinet stood between two of the aisles. Containing butter, milk and cheese.

There were open shelves. With colourful display signs drawing attention.

And bins stacked with fruits and vegetables. With scales for customers to weigh. And empty paper sacks beneath.

The staff had even pre-packed dry bulk goods. Like oats, nuts and seeds. In friendly sizes. And placed them towards the end of the shopper's journey.

Customers browsed around happily. Picking their own wares. Instead of depending on clerks.

And ended up at the checkout stand. Where the cashier issued them a printed receipt. Tearing it off from the adding machine tape. Wonder of wonders!

And they finally exited through another turnstile. Their shopping done!

Day One best sellers were sugar, flour, baking powder and dried beans.

Saunders had knocked it out of the park!

A series of firsts

Right on launch day, Piggly Wiggly had showcased several of Saunders' inventions.

Price tags.

The refrigerated cabinet for milk.

The checkout stand.

The printed receipt.

Self-help: The best help

Piggly Wiggly's merchandise was clean and fresh. And consistent in quality.

Shoppers didn't have to settle for a stale loaf of bread. Or overripe bananas. Or a three-month-old pack of corn flakes.

After all, they filled their own baskets. There was no sales clerk around to pretend, "Phew ... managed to get you the last piece, sir!"

Picking up their own groceries appealed to blue-collar Americans. And to their sense of self-reliance.

Their ad campaign kept educating consumers.

"At any place in a Piggly Wiggly store that you see anything you want, you have a perfect right to take with your own hands. The very thing that appeals to you. And which you desire to purchase."

"Do things which you can best do for yourself. Without argument with a clerk. Without persuasion from him. Without quibbling over prices. Without even recommendation by him. As to which article is better than another."

Aisle of the beholder

Shoppers were free to try out new or cheaper brands. They were spoilt for choice.

Products now needed to catch the buyers' eye. As they strolled past shelves.

So manufacturers' packaging had to do the talking. To stand out. And their promotional placards began showing up all over the lanes.

A buyers market

Unlike mom-and-pop stores, Piggly Wiggly consciously stocked an exhaustive range. Including national brands. Campbell’s. Kellogg's. Hershey's. Local suppliers were now up against the best.

So advertisers needed to raise the bar. Since shoppers would reach out for familiar brands. By instinct.

A one-stop shop

You no longer had to drop by your neighbourhood bakery for cakes. The butcher for meat. The confectioner for candy. The vegetable grocer for your greens. The pharmacy for cosmetics. And the corner store for dry goods.

Piggly Wiggly carried everything on your shopping list.

A new business model

Unlike classic groceries, Piggly Wiggly didn't accept telephone orders. Didn't make home deliveries. Didn't extend credit.

High order volumes helped them negotiate with suppliers. And they passed these savings on to consumers. Marking items at cost plus 14 percent. Way below the industry standard 33 percent.

A trick or two

Piggly Wiggly started keeping jars of candy at the checkout. Customers would pop them into their basket on impulse.

Saunders would often hang up a new sign. Or shift an item. From one section to another. To maximise sales.

Self-service tempted shoplifters. But this barely mattered. In the larger scheme of things.

When the universe conspired

1917. US entered World War I. Shortages led food and commodity prices to go up.

And labour became scarce. With the able-bodied enlisting for military service.

This was a double whammy for traditional grocers. Whose business dropped.

But an opportunity for Piggly Wiggly.

They innovated yet again. By becoming the industry's first retail chain to issue franchises. To hundreds of independently owned grocers. To run their own Piggly Wiggly stores. Converting from clerk-service to self-service.

And so these "groceterias" proliferated. Named after the cafeteria-style eateries. That had also begun mushrooming by then.

An idea whose time had come

Saunders waited just three weeks after his first Piggly Wiggly. Before opening a second one across town. "Piggly Wiggly Junior."

The next month he'd put up a third store. "Piggly Wiggly the Third."

And in Dec 1916, "Piggly Wiggly the Fourth."

1917. Memphis had nine Piggly Wigglies in all.

1921. 615 stores across the country. Piggly Wiggly was now America's largest newspaper advertiser.

1923. 1,267 stores. 667 owned by Piggly Wiggly. The rest by franchisees. Third largest grocery chain in the US.

1932. The company was operating 2,660 stores now. And had posted USD 180 million in sales.

Imitation: the best form of flattery

Piggly Wiggly had changed the rules of the game.

Their unprecedented success spawned a long line of copycats. Handy Andy stores. Helpy Selfy stores. Mick-or-Mack stores. Hoggly Woggly. Each of them tinkered with the original store design. To skip paying Saunders his rightful licensing fee.

A string of patents

Saunders had to protect his intellectual property. He went about applying for and receiving many patents. Over a decade.

Oct 9, 1917. US-1242872. "Concept of self-serving store".

Mar 18, 1919. US-1297405. "Means of tagging prices next to the grocery item". Which was, after all, a small hook fixed above every item. Making it easy for staff to change price tags.

Nov 2, 1920. US-1357521. "Self-serving store equipment and layout".

Nov 22, 1921. US-1397824. "Self-serving store portable furniture unit design".

Feb 21, 1922. US-1407680. "Efficient lighting system for self-serving store". Which consisted of light fixtures attached to the ceiling. Shining on every section. In every aisle.

Dec 5, 1922. US-1437554. "Display cabinets, entrance and exit turnstiles, partitions, checkout stand and basket rack. For self-serving store".

Nov 1, 1927. US-1647889. "Arrangement and construction of self-serving store fixtures".

Staying ahead of the curve

Piggly Wiggly was the first store where food-handling staff started wearing uniforms.

And the first to introduce multiple payment lanes. With point-of-sale devices on the counter.

1937. Piggly Wiggly introduced shopping carts for customers. At their Oklahoma City branch. The first ever store to do so. It was a rather simple contraption. Two shopping baskets. Stacked one above the other. And affixed to a metal frame on wheels.

They'd pioneered these supermarket features. That we take for granted today.

Then and now

A lot has transpired in the decades since. Long story short, competitors kept acquiring the Piggly Wiggly empire. In bits and pieces.

They're down to 503 stores now. In 423 cities. Across 18 states.

But a signboard still stands proudly near the site. Of the original Piggly Wiggly store.

Proclaiming, "With a brass band, a beauty contest, flowers for the ladies and balloons for the children, Clarence Saunders of Memphis opened the first Piggly Wiggly. America's first completely self-service grocery store. Half a block west of here. On Sep 6, 2016. By 1921, Piggly Wiggly Corporation had franchised stores in 200 cities in 40 states. With sales of $60 million. In only five years Saunders had revolutionized the US grocery industry."

As a tribute to the store with a gibberish name. And to the legacy of the man.

Who'd changed the way Americans bought food. More than a century ago. For ever.

Please do leave a comment. Would love hearing from you!

Until next time. Take care of yourself. :)

#PigglyWiggly #SelfService #Grocery #Business