Sampling at a vegetable vendor

This brief post is about what went through my mind this morning, a little after 9 O’clock on a Sunday, when I was shopping for vegetables in a corporate grocery-cum-vegetable store Reliance Fresh in Paschim Vihar, New Delhi. The busiest aisle was the one with the vegetables lined up, and many ladies (and a few gents, including me) picking and choosing the choicest.

First, I have to set the stage. All these shops are characterized by lack of space, particularly, narrow aisles. Considering this, one can also say that the trolleys on offer for carting the purchase through them are oversized; two trolleys can barely squeeze by side by side.

In the non-corporate subzi markets, it is not uncommon to see buyers choosing and rejecting carefully, one piece at a time, from a mound of tomatoes, potatoes, green chillies, okra, eggplant, or beans, and what is most interesting in this exercise is the art of choosing. I have noticed that if two people are side by side, if a piece is rejected by one, the other will not even give it a glance. Such implicit faith in fellow shoppers! Of course, the shopkeeper may have a thing or two, mostly critical, to say – about slowing down business, about clipping the ends of okra (wastage). But, the veteran subzi shopper is immune to all such criticisms, armed with personal anecdotes to throw back at the vendor! They know that the vendor has intelligently mixed up the good with the bad and this is best countered by being overly and overtly picky, sending the unmistakable message, “You can’t fool me!” This is a perpetual game and eternally entertaining.

But, in a shop like Reliance Fresh, there is only one player in the game, the shopper. The vendor is nowhere to be seen. You cannot have an ongoing dialogue with the vendor. The shopper cannot go one-up on the non-existent vendor. No matter, the process of picking and choosing goes on.

This is what happened this morning. A lady, on the wrong side of middle age, was picking from a tray of onions. She was squatting on the floor and was doing her routine of picking one onion, rejecting another, picking up and smelling yet another only to reject and on and on. She just would not allow anyone to infringe upon her freedom to pick and choose while she blocked the aisle. What was intensely interesting to me was that not a single shopper voiced any disapproval of her commandeering space and not allowing them to move forward in the aisle.

Indeed, when I did, I was almost set upon. I retreated fast! Perhaps it was an unlucky day for me. This scenario came alive again, in front of the tray containing okra. Another lady, not quite middle aged yet, was going through the routine with okra, clipping the end to confirm that it – each okra – was still fresh. After my first experience in front of the onion tray, I knew better than to open my mouth.

That is when I thought that these shoppers have not understood the principle of sampling. With a vendor pushing a wheel-cart, one has to do sampling at a scale nearing 100%. He may not be doing a quality-check at his wholesaler. Your larger sampling is counter to that reality.

But at corporate establishments, particularly ones that advertise their quality standards (their sales propositions are both cost and quality), the sampling size can indeed be reduced, reduced much. Indeed, if you saw any discounts on a vegetable, you can be sure that it is not of good quality – it is on what is euphemistically called “clearance sale!” If you still want to buy from that lot, you are welcome to it, but there cannot be any advantage in going through your “choice” therapy. Statistically speaking, you will be left with many a lemon no matter how much time you spent choosing and blocking the aisle.

It is simply a matter of sampling techniques inappropriately applied. What is valid for a push-cart vendor is not OK in the aisles of a corporate vendor.

A lesson learnt at the supermarket today.

Raghuram Ekambaram