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Markets in everything
"Express 7-11."
Go there if you find that a standard 7-11 involves too much inconvenience and delay. There is a new Express 7-11 near campus, right next to an old (non-express) 7-11.
Posted by Tyler Cowen on February 25, 2008 at 01:38 PM in Current Affairs | Permalink
Comments
I believe the term of art is "hassle."
It is amazing how many unnecessary products attempt to convince you of their necessity by proclaiming that they avoid the "hassle" of the previously existing product that none of us really felt hassled by in the past.
Posted by: Rich B. at Feb 25, 2008 3:31:00 PM
"Express", describing stores, is one of those marketing euphemisms like "fun-size" for candy bars that means "smaller and not as good". Sure, the new product has some redeeming features (easier to get to/find things, fewer calories), but ultimately will probably leave you unsatisfied because you didn't get everything you wanted.
Posted by: Kat at Feb 25, 2008 3:41:07 PM
I think that I would regularly stay at a "Holiday Inn Express" if I could actually get a good nights sleep in, say, 2 to 4 hours... Now *that* would be worth something.
Posted by: Alex R at Feb 25, 2008 4:06:29 PM
I live near a "24 Hour Fitness Express". Get slimmer faster. Oh yes, and it is right next to a McDonald's drive thru.
Posted by: stanfo at Feb 25, 2008 4:45:45 PM
Well then, has McD's come out with a Super-Dooper Size french fries yet - cuz I refuse to go back until they do. In the 80's
everything suddenly became "New and Improved" labeled, so I've been waiting for the "Newer-still and Reimproved" versions -
else I'm not going to buy them (and if you're buying any of this, I've got a bridge ...). The point being that there's a
constant need to out-do the prior issue, and market the next best thing - so if you've already got a name like Jiffy Lube,
can you keep outdoing yourself ... anyone up for a Nano Lube? So back to 7-11, already understood as a convenience store -
so now there's a convenience to a convenience store, expressed as "Express". We've all heard "in a rush to get nowhere fast"
- so now we can save 30 seconds (maybe) on getting a Slurpee, in order to get home and watch a half minute extra commercials
on TV, right? My 18 year old starting beating me at Donkey Kong and Super Mario Bros since he was six - so perhaps it's the
speed in which this generation operates that requires that kind of sensational enticement ... full throttle, left-lane only.
Posted by: TomG at Feb 25, 2008 5:07:18 PM
Grouchy people today. 7-11 does you a favor, and you complain.
Due to market conditions (availability of space, rent, type of market) it makes sense for a retailer to have more than one format. To avoid confusion, they give them a different name that is evocative: "express" means smaller, "supercenter" means larger.
This makes it more likely that a customer will find the type of experience they are looking for.
Posted by: ZBicyclist at Feb 25, 2008 6:47:58 PM
ZB, there is something to complain about here - ya see, as the Boomers get older and the arteries start to harden more, it'll
get increasingly more difficult to understand the multiplicity of "features", "options", "formats", ad nauseum ... that are
to be offered if the trend continues (truthfully, how many of the buttons on your remote do you *truly* ever use?) - sending
us sooner into the rubber-padded facilities (31 Flavors are now 131, and I'm already defaulting to Vanilla every time ;)
Posted by: TomG at Feb 25, 2008 7:02:21 PM
i think the express means less selection. you can get in and out quicker when you don't have to evaluate the utility of eight varieties of crisps.
Posted by: anon at Feb 25, 2008 7:28:33 PM
7-11 Express. Half the stuff of the limited selection you find in a regular 7-11, and half again the inflated price you've come to depend on from 7-11, with 72% fewer intoxicated patrons on a Saturday Night!
Posted by: ShortWoman at Feb 25, 2008 7:28:51 PM
So 7-11 is giving you a choice for less choice? Barry Schwartz's head must be exploding right now.
Posted by: Hei Lun Chan at Feb 25, 2008 8:20:45 PM
I'm a grad student. On both of the campuses I've been on in the last six years, they've had little stores like this. I frequented them both. I drove by grocery stores that would be cheaper, because they would have taken a lot more time. It wouldn't surprise me if 7-11 could have run them better.
The only things that I buy there are beer, mixers, energy drinks, and gum. As far as I'm concerned the rest of the store is a waste of space. If my preference for expediency is displacing your preference for chili-flavored pork rinds, I feel for you, such is The Tyranny of the Market.
Posted by: Charlie at Feb 25, 2008 10:22:32 PM
Actually your frequenting it for just those four items is helping ensure that it stays lucrative as a business format, which
help out someone else's demand for same/other items carried by that establishment. If chipotle-sauced Rocky Mountain oysters
became a viable substitute for those pork rinds, then my getting friends to switch over would be such tyranny in action - and
a fair outcome indeed.
Posted by: TomG at Feb 26, 2008 2:47:35 AM
Remember when 7-11s were actually open from 7 to 11?
Posted by: James B. at Feb 26, 2008 6:46:25 AM
Just for 4 hours - that's preposterous ... how could they get someone to endure such a shift ;) In that vein, speaking of
shorter and smaller than once, we just bought some Keebler chocolate covered graham cookies for the first time in years,
and were stunned at how much smaller they are now (same as how the ice cream containers have gotten smaller, so I don't
think I'm imagining it)
Posted by: TomG at Feb 26, 2008 8:53:21 AM
The biggest bottleneck in any 7-11 is people buying lotto tickets. If the Express 7-11 sells them, then they have defeated the point of having an Express 7-11.
Posted by: bartman at Feb 26, 2008 10:11:00 AM
TomG check coffee next time you buy it. Very few cans contain a full 16oz anymore.
Posted by: bob at Feb 26, 2008 10:29:47 AM
No, I think this person is right - when it comes to 7-11 at least, it is like saying that the original 7-11 was SO large that an express was necessary - as for lotto tickets, grocery stores solved this problem by having automated machines. I also work for an 'errand reduction' company. Which means that when it is convenient for them they sell you things that profit them more largely than the savings extended to you. We are 'helping' by being an extra middle man. Amazing isn't it?
Posted by: J at Feb 26, 2008 12:36:41 PM
"TomG check coffee next time you buy it. Very few cans contain a full 16oz anymore."
Is this all part of the "Small is Beautiful" and "Less is More" movements ;) Coffee's one of my two drugs of choice in life
so I haven't bought coffee by the can in over a decade, instead having it freshly ground and into a bag. But judging from
how much extra box cereal actually comes in, I'm not surprised anymore.
Posted by: TomG at Feb 26, 2008 4:33:52 PM
