Supermarket express check out lanes
Supermarket express check out lanes
(OP)
The sign over the express check out lane most often reads "10 items or less."
To be correct it should read "10 items or fewer."
Fewer is used when the items are quantifiable.
Less is used for items that are not easily quantified, or are conceptual.
Can signs read?
To be correct it should read "10 items or fewer."
Fewer is used when the items are quantifiable.
Less is used for items that are not easily quantified, or are conceptual.
Can signs read?





RE: Supermarket express check out lanes
RE: Supermarket express check out lanes
And is a six pack 1 item or 6 items? What if canned corn is three for the price of one? One item or three?
Should we limit the number of scans performed by the cashier to ten? We can do this with software! Any remaining items automatically get dumped down a chute for re-stocking.
Just a thought.
RE: Supermarket express check out lanes
Checkout staff are slow enough as it is.... where scanners meant to speed things up? When i was at college i worked in a supermarket with the old style cash registers and in the event of a power cut you had to hand crank them. I remeber being a whole lot faster handcranking than todays scanner system checkout operators.
John Henry .... is it he i am thinking of? I wonder why?
RE: Supermarket express check out lanes
TTFN
RE: Supermarket express check out lanes
"10 items or fewer."?
I can't quite equate to yer explanation. could you differentiate that for me or maybe it needs to be integrated. I heard this whooshing sound as it flew over my head.
More on 10 items or not-so-many-please:
A few weeks ago my wife and I were shopping at Walmart. As we approached the checkout region (this being a superplex center or whatever they call it), we could see that most of the lines were quite bulky with people and goods so my wifey does a u-turn and heads for a 10 items or... stand even tho we be sporting a gaggle (definitely was not a flock)of goods in our shopping cart. I objected but she persisted saying nobody else was in that line anyhow. The checker was not nonplussed (boy is that awkward. How come there ain't no word like plussed?) and kept on checking. Anyway I began feeling very guilty and being the slob that I am, walked off in a huff to go warm up the car being winter and all and not wanting to be a part of this nefarious scandal.
And now as Paul Harvey would say, "the rest of the story."
My wifey works for that very Walmart and sometimes fills-in as a checker and said it is perfectly acceptable practice when the checker is standing there doing nothing. Oh well, go figure! Sometimes signs don't mean what they say correct grammar or no. And can you believe it - we did not even have an argument over this but then we've been married a looong time.(?) And now you know the rest of the story.
Jesus is THE life,
Leonard
RE: Supermarket express check out lanes
Use "fewer" when it is possible to actually count the difference.
"Fewer people wear their hair in the Mohawk style today then in the late 70's."
Use less when you can't count, or when comparing an abstract concept.
"The Mohawk is a less popular hair style now then it was in the late 70's."
RE: Supermarket express check out lanes
Then, logically, "10 items or less" is PERFECTLY acceptable, cuz it's obvious that these people CAN'T count!
TTFN
RE: Supermarket express check out lanes
RE: Supermarket express check out lanes
Your definition would seem to clearly put "10 items or less" in the wrong; otherwise it would only be correct if it were something like "10 pounds of stuff or less."
TTFN
RE: Supermarket express check out lanes
I see very little difference between my original post and your paraphrasing of Fowler's.
RE: Supermarket express check out lanes
RE: Supermarket express check out lanes
But, to insist on that usage seems to be overly pedantic, since everyone who reads it understands the general gist of the phrase.
The separation of "fewer" vs. "less" seems to me to be an anacronism, mimicking the development of the wave/particle duality of matter. Since matter is both, then whether you use "fewer" or "less" is irrelevant.
TTFN
RE: Supermarket express check out lanes
RE: Supermarket express check out lanes
Jesus is THE life,
Leonard
RE: Supermarket express check out lanes
TTFN
RE: Supermarket express check out lanes
(participle?)
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RE: Supermarket express check out lanes
http://www.askoxford.com/asktheexperts/faq/aboutgrammar/lessfewer?view=uk
It is interesting to note that even this site contains a spelling mistake :
http://www.askoxford.com/asktheexperts/faq/aboutgrammar/numberofpeople?view=uk
"A number of people ar (sic) waiting for the bus".
I think this should be a lesson in humility to all of us.
RE: Supermarket express check out lanes
I used to wonder about the sign in the supermarket I used to use. It read:
"10 items or less and hand baskets"
I could never work out if they meant that you could take as much through as you liked in a hand basket, or that you could only use hand baskets and if you wheeled up a trolley with 9 goods in it they'd turn you away.
It used to make my blood boil seeing people carry more than the prescribed number of items through the (laughably called) "express" checkouts without anyone querying them.
Then once in a busy supermarket a supervisor told me to use the express checkout, which was empty, with my trolley loaded with (a later count verified) 49 items.
The checkout girl refused to let me through until I pointed out the EXACT supervisor who had instructed me on where to go.
Then I had to listen to a 5 minute rant about how unfair it all was.
I hate shopping...
"I love deadlines. I love the whooshing noise they make as they go past." Douglas Adams
RE: Supermarket express check out lanes
Keep the wheels on the ground
Bob
RE: Supermarket express check out lanes
A little duct tape would cure that problem.
I'm in Texas...we fix everything with Duct tape.
How about: 10 items or less, hand baskets or children.
Why is aisle pronounced "I'll"?
RE: Supermarket express check out lanes
RE: Supermarket express check out lanes
Good Luck
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As a circle of light increases so does the circumference of darkness around it. - Albert Einstein
RE: Supermarket express check out lanes
I think that to rid the consumer of such questionable vocabulary that "NO MORE THEN 10 ITEMS" could be the new sign...
RE: Supermarket express check out lanes
I really hate shopping.
"I love deadlines. I love the whooshing noise they make as they go past." Douglas Adams
RE: Supermarket express check out lanes
(or Shopping-mas as we call it)
Keep the wheels on the ground
Bob
RE: Supermarket express check out lanes
I don't know if a star is warranted...but I agree 1000%.
Can you have 1000% of something?
Another thread I guess.
Rerig
After thought...have women ever considered where men learn what the word NO means.
You know...when they say "No means No!"
Men are asked "Do you want to go shopping?" "NO!"
"oh, come on..go shopping with me." "NO"
"Well, just drive me there" "NO"
"If you loved me you would go with me" "Please, NO"
"If you don't go, you'll regret it" "Damn...OK"
So, to men, No doesn't mean No...it means, whine until you give in. (I had to go shopping last night...sorry)
RE: Supermarket express check out lanes
We are worrying about what “6 items or less” really mean. That’s wrong. It isn’t what the sign says, it is what it is that is important.
It is a control. We are increasingly victims of Pavlovian style conditioning to conform. We are being managed and manipulated.
Take traffic lights. When the traffic is heavy they help keep it moving. OK, but how many of you have sat at a red light at 4 in the morning waiting for it to change when there is absolutely no other traffic about.
Maybe there is a camera on the junction or a cop hiding round the corner. You go through that red light and what will happen? You’ll be charged with dangerous driving. Why? Because driving through a red light is, axiomatically, dangerous driving.
The “6 items or less” rule is a manifestation of this control over our every moment.
OK, try this: you have 10 items. All the checkouts are manned. You are the only shopper (or the only one with a basket). Go to the 6 items or less lane. You know what will happen, don’t you?
Shopping is an exact science today and every bit of that science is bought and paid for by the chain stores, the advertising and marketing agencies, the supermarkets. Each day their ability to predict and control our behaviour intensifies. They start on us as children. They are working on our children now.
They know the exact shade of red on the baked bean tins that sells the maximum number of beans. They know the value of having the fresh veg section at the entrance instead of near the end of the shopping trail (see how many trolleys in the fresh veg are full i.e. where the shopper has had to come back for the fresh veg).
These are the guys who put candy (sweets) at the checkouts.
They’re the ones who know the exact degree to which children influence shopping decisions
Why advertise cars in children’s TV? It is because they know the buying (pester/persistence) power of children. Children who can’t drive and have no money can control what cars are bought. Fact.
So now think again about those “awkward” customers. Who are they? Why do they do these things? To make us mad?
Well I tell you, I’m beginning to think they are the last rebels, the only ones holding out for the individual over the corporation.
Maybe it is now time to take a hand in this war.
What is the maximum number of items you can successfully take through a 6 or less till? Try it. Be prepared to abandon your shopping on the belt… don’t let the option be to go and queue at another till, make it a “take me or lose the sale” deal.
One thing, it will either make your shopping experience a little more fun or it will get you excused by the wife.
JMW
www.ViscoAnalyser.com
RE: Supermarket express check out lanes
A shopper got into the "6 items or less" line during a very busy part of the day when all lines, including the express line were stacked with customers. (Ok, they are really only "potential" customers at this point since they have not yet paid. I point this out because there seem to be some RE-AA-LL-Y picky people in this forum.)
Anyway, she gets up to the checker with her cart full of goodies and the checker sweetly says, "So. Which 6 items did you want to purchase?" Now THAT is diplomacy!
RE: Supermarket express check out lanes
Very cute story -- shades of 1984 etc -- BUT
"Sometimes signs don't mean what they say correct grammar or no."
Above extracted from first post of March 8, '04. Can you believe we have been doing this for almost a year!? Maybe we should get a life.
RE: Supermarket express check out lanes
It's the same with the "leave your bags at the counter" thing. I won't - when I ask if they will take responsibility for its contents while it is in their custody, they will say "No". So why should I take responsibility for their goods if they won't accept it for mine?
PS in South Africa I (and most other sensible people) would ignore red lights at night - wouldn't want to be hi-jacked. And the only legal penalty was a fine. Here in Oz they are uncivil enough to count how often you do it and take your licence away.
Bung
Life is non-linear...
RE: Supermarket express check out lanes
Don't get me started on traffic lights!
Has anyone else noticed how frequently on quiet roads, at night, they turn red as you approach; you wait for ages until a car approaches from the other direction, THEN they change again, to stop the other car and let you go?
It's spooky, I tell you.
Rant over..Zen-like calm descending...
"I love deadlines. I love the whooshing noise they make as they go past." Douglas Adams