Editing Supermarket (section)

===Self-service grocery stores===

The concept of a self-service grocery store predates the supermarket; it was developed by entrepreneur [[Clarence Saunders (grocer)|Clarence Saunders]] at his [[Piggly Wiggly]] stores, the first of which opened in 1916.<ref name="Deener_Page_73">{{cite book |last1=Deener |first1=Andrew |title=The Problem with Feeding Cities: The Social Transformation of Infrastructure, Abundance, and Inequality in America |date=2020 |publisher=University of Chicago Press |location=Chicago |isbn=9780226703077 |page=73 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=98byDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA73 |access-date=January 8, 2023}}</ref> Saunders was awarded several patents for the ideas he incorporated into his stores.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://patents.google.com/patent/US1242872A/en|title=Self-serving store.}}</ref><ref>{{cite web| url=https://patents.google.com/patent/US1407680A/en|title=Lighting system for self-serving stores}}</ref><ref>{{cite web| url=https://patents.google.com/patent/US1704061A/en|title=Self-serving store}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=https://patents.google.com/patent/US1647889A/en|title=Arrangement and construction of store fixtures}}</ref> The stores were a financial success and Saunders began to offer franchises.

The general trend since then has been to stock shelves at night so that customers, the following day, can obtain their own goods and bring them to the front of the store to pay for them. Although there is a higher risk of [[shoplifting]], the costs of appropriate security measures ideally will be outweighed by reduced labor costs.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://knappily.com/article/5b90bd0f08798e4f0dc84253|title=September 6, 1916: The first supermarket opens for business|date=6 September 2018|publisher=Knappily|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201025155834/https://knappily.com/article/5b90bd0f08798e4f0dc84253|archive-date=25 October 2020|access-date=27 April 2022}}</ref>{{unreliable source?|date=April 2022}}