seem to follow at least one side of 'Walmartization' - rather than squeeze the customers - who, as you note, don't really have anything left to squeeze - squeeze on the other end, and find ways to pay less to suppliers and service providers. Walmart did that by being so large that they essentially became the sole purchaser for many suppliers, who then became dependent on Walmart as their only client, allowing Walmart to essentially threaten to ruin them if they took their business away. Other grocers may or may not have that ability, but they likely still are a significant source of income for many of the providers with whom they deal.

I might suggest going a different route, and actually hiring on a nutritionist/chef, as least as a contractor, to help design meal plans that provide simple to make healthy meals from items the stores sell that help minimize customer food waste, and have in-store flyers as well as a website. This both helps customers waste less of what they purchase, but can be used to move specific product, and even increase sales, since many customers (such as myself) view coming up with different meal ideas week after week as an annoying chore and you might draw from competitors. This might be seen as something an 'upscale' chain might do, but I think it's a decent idea for even a regular grocery.

The other major spot to be addressed is perishable waste. From what I've seen, there's likely to be a lot of it in many stores. Grocers might want to push some sort of 'in-house CSA' program in conjunction with the designer meals idea, whereby customers essentially agree to purchase 'x amount of fresh fruit and veg' each week, perhaps for a slight discount, and simply buying the foods you'd need for the designer menu would cover those purchases.

Yes, it certainly does point towards squeezing suppliers of goods and services, but really all businesses and consumers should be shopping around for the best deal they can get in any case and frankly I suspect most are already doing so.

What I found lacking, was a push for the long term and the potential that energy savings might contribute to store facilities. Adding skylights, roof top solar, roof top gardens to grow some of the produce and wind turbines are all potentials along with solar panels/wind turbines on the parking lots. A push towards composting the perishable wastes is an option along with other recycling efforts that can be easily implemented. The use of new lighting in stores such as LED's in the cases and higher efficiency bulbs in the overhead fixtures can benefit both the bottom line and the environment as a whole.

I believe that your idea of a nutritionist/dietician/chef are excellent and some chains have made some efforts in those regards. Some stores do in-store demos, some use other media types such as video monitors, recipe kiosks, web sites, web site links and social media sites to get this information out. I am sure that the results are mixed, but nutrition education is I believe vitally important to the future. It also offers the potential benefit of possibly reducing obesity or at least making efforts in that direction.

There are a lot of opportunities to save and invest for future savings without necessarily cutting wages or squeezing suppliers (who will then need to implement their own cuts) but it often requires forward thinking and that sometimes is not at the forefront.

Who pays $7/lb for sirloin, or $10-12/lb for ribeyes, or $14 and up per pound for T-bones and porterhouse steaks? You can drop over $30 for the meat alone to feed a family. When they don't sell as steaks, retailers ground them into hamburger before it spoils. That's why you're paying $4 and more per pound for ground beef.

Notice how the food manufacturers deal with this by putting products in smaller packages and charging the same price, or a negligible increase? You used to have one-pound packages of various products, now they're in packages of 13.4 oz., 14.1 oz., or some other goofy amount of weight.

Cripe, paper towels now come in panels about the size of a toilet paper panel. That way they can put on the label that you have the same number of panels, when you probably only have about 70% of the paper.

Grocery stores are one of the most data driven businesses in existence. From loyalty cards to managing 100,000 SKUs they use relational databases and modeling. Most large grocery chains operate at around a 1% net margin so they need to manage every expense carefully. Beating up your vendors, eg the snow plow guy, is not going to make up for a 3% rise in costs IMHO.

One of the more exciting developments in food retailing recently has been the rise of in-store cafes. Grocery chains were actually a bit slow to pick up on this as places like Barnes & Noble and even Nordstrom have had in store cafes for 10 years. Whole Foods has shown the rest of the industry how much potential this has as their larger stores can have a sushi bar, pizza bar, etc and most of their stores have ready-to-eat salad bars.

The economy has been tough on fast food and casual dining restaurants. More people are eating at home to save money which means that people increasingly go to the grocery instead of a sit down restaurant after work. This is good for groceries because people are walking in the door hungry -- adding the cafe gets them extra revenue and at higher margin than the store average. That is what they desperately need.

In the long run, groceries are being pressured on every side. The birthrate in the US is below 65% so the pool of future customers is much smaller and will have even more price-sensitivity than the current customers. There is also rising pressure for the Feds to cut back the variety of subsidies that keep beef, milk and other foods at artificially low prices. CW in groceries is that most customers only remember the price of 4 items in your store -- milk, ground beef, bananas and (something else, I can't remember) So in addition to the subsidies, the store is also subsidizing the price by selling milk for less than they pay for it. Around 85% of customer shop on price alone -- not brand, not quality, not seasonality, not health concerns, just price.

Most groceries make no money at all on fresh produce -- high waste, sales/square foot is low, lots of labor. That is where the 1% net margin is coming from -- some food sold at a loss, some perishable food thrown away, and some processed foods (like soda, chips, cookies, condiments, nutritional supplements) that they make money on. Some of their best margin are on the bakery counter so the in-store cafes build on that.

Americans have no idea how cheap their food is, they only see the increases. When the dam really breaks -- if the US dollar slips, when oil spikes again and permanently, if austerity cuts food subsidies (both farm and WIC), if unemployment spikes (again) -- then it's a whole new world for groceries because their current business model and a 1% margin can't survive stuff like that.

Many articles in trade publications are written by those seeking to sell their services and Yes, beating up on the snow plow guy isn't going to make up the 3%. That said businesses and individuals both need to review the cost of their services when possible, such as insurance coverage, solid waste disposal and alike to see if there are better deals out there to be had. It's simple price shopping and we all do it when we go to the grocery store.

With regard to in store cafes, I am old enough to recall the in-store restaurant/soda fountain being phased out as not cost effective and labor intensive so I don't think it is necessarily the case that grocers are slow to pick up on this point, but rather a been there, done that point of view. Doesn't mean that what once was will not return, but it's not a new idea.

I believe the author did make some valid points in discussing narrowing store or house brands and simply shopping around for services. I think he also missed many areas in which there are often saving to be had such as solid waste disposal and store energy use to name a couple. Wal Mart (although I am no fan of theirs) is developing a higher efficiency tractor trailer for the future that seems to hold great promise which will naturally be better for them, but also help the environment by using less fuel.

Most stores crush and bale cardboard for recycling, this has gone on for decades. Donating usable products to a local food pantry can not only help those in need, but save in the area of solid waste. Single streaming would do much more along those lines and many be a bottom line plus.

Most stores have flat roofs which even working around lines for air conditioners and compressors have sufficient areas for solar panels that would cover at least some of the store's usage.

You are absolutely right in what you stated there are lots of pressures on grocers and retailers in all market areas.