Shopping Cart Day on June 4 calls for a celebration of the baskets on wheels we use to journey through the aisles in a supermarket. The inventor of shopping carts wanted to increase the time customers spent in a supermarket to maximize the overall profitability rates by expanding the medium to temporarily carry items in-store.
The initial designs included baskets and carriage capacity factors. Many other points related to push-pull ease, wheel rotation, and material heaviness also had to be considered.
- 1937 – Sylvan Goldman, the owner of the Humpty Dumpty supermarket chain, invents the first shopping cart, calling it the folding basket carrier.
- Goldman was inspired by a folding chair. He placed a wire basket on the folding chair, wheeling it around his office to see its efficacy.
- 1940 – Shopping carts became popular in 1940, all thanks to peer pressure. Goldman hired saleswomen to offer shopping carts to incoming customers at the entrance. When they would refuse to take a cart, the saleswomen would ask them the reason as everyone else in the supermarket was using it. The ‘everyone else’ she was referring to was hired models who pretended to shop. In the end, the reluctant customers would be convinced to take the carts.
- 1946 – To save space, Orla Watson invents a ‘nesting’ cart by adding a swinging rear door to the shopping cart.
- 1947 – Goldman adds a child seat to his shopping carts, solving many customers’ concerns about pushing a pram and a cart at the same time.
- 1950s – Then, in the 1950s, the shopping cart we all know and love – the one with a big basket, was introduced.
- 1960s – Since the 1960s, when seatbelts were added to the child seat, the design of the shopping cart has not changed much.
- 2012 – Chaotic Moon Labs invented a driverless shopping cart for indoor use, and it is called ‘Project Sk8’.
- A study at Brigham Young University stated that if you didn’t want to spend too much money while shopping, you should do so while wearing high heels.
- There are more shopping malls in America than there are schools.
- There is no correct term for a shopping cart as the name differs based on where you are. In America, it is called a shopping cart, but in Britain, it is referred to as a trolley.
- Shopping Facts:
- The first customer service complaint was in Mesopotamia 4,000 years ago when a customer named Nanni complained about being sold inferior copper ingots.
- During the late 1800s, you could purchase divorce papers through a vending machine for $2.50 in Utah.
- Who knew there were so many songs about shopping carts by many different artists? Here are some titles:
- Shopping Carts by J. Monty (2019)
- Lost in the Supermarket by The Clash (1979)
- Shopping Trolley by Beth Orton (2006)
- Shopping Bags by De La Soul (2004)
- Carts generally cost between $100 and $150 each.
- Almost every major city has one or more companies whose sole business is to retrieve and return abandoned carts to their rightful owners for a small fee.
- The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) reported that 20,700 kids under 5 years old were treated in hospital emergency rooms for shopping cart-related accidents in 2005. About 75% of these injuries were to the head or neck with about 85% occurring after a kid fell out of the cart or caused the cart to tip over.
- With the exception of the automobile, the shopping cart is the most commonly used “vehicle” in the world: some 25 million are at grocery stores across the U.S. alone (according to priceonomics.com).
- Carts typically last about 10 years.
- Want to cut down on your consumption of junk food? Avoid using a basket. As it turns out, the strain that a basket makes on your arm is more likely to get you searching for the instant gratification of a Snickers bar (via Time).
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