TWITTER is the new tool being used to fight against high supermarket prices across Australia.
Following the failure of the Federal Government’s Grocery Choice website – set up to help shoppers find the lowest grocery prices in supermarkets around the country – a group of IT experts are using Twitter and Google Groups to develop Price Check, a website they hope will save shoppers money.
Using crowd-sourcing technology, shoppers will eventually be able to log onto the web or via a mobile phone application to find the best-priced supermarket items in their area.
The website will allow shoppers to enter their entire shopping list on the website to find the best prices.
Users will also be asked to update price items.
“I think I am heavily in favour of an open system and I believe there should be access to the public,’’ idea developer Rob Mason told news.com.au.
“(Users) will be able to enter their postcode … and source products on the site linked to the data base and compare prices and find which supermarket is best-priced.”
Mr Mason said the more the public demand access to cheaper prices, the more likely supermarket giants such as Coles and Woolworths will comply.
He said the response from Twitter users has been “fantastic”.
“If we get people involved and active, we can get all the prices in all the supermarkets,” he said.
“The feedback has been really good; we have gathered as much followers as the big supermarkets.”
Mr Mason said the major supermarkets have a responsibility to be open about their prices.
He admitted if successful, the Price Check idea would be unpopular with the supermarket chains.
“There is absolutely no commercial gain for them to be had by being open and transparent,” he said.
“At the moment it is more of a social thing, supporting an open system rather than saving heaps of money … but there is a potential.”
Follow @price_check for notification of the website launch.
Source www.news.com.au
Supermarket internet shopping has arrived in Perth, with Coles launching the service a few weeks ago and Woolworths expected to follow its rival’s lead within months.
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Retail hiring jumps on spending hopes
Posted in Jobs and careers, tagged ABS, according, anticipation, April, ARA, Australia, Australian, Australian Bureau of Statistics, Australian Retailers Association., bigger retailers, boosting, cash, casual employment, commentary, confidence, consumer, consumer emerges, consumer spending, David Jones, debt, delivery, demand, employed, employment, Executive Director, fear-filled, Federal, female, fiscal, forecasting, fuelled, Government’s, grow, high levels, hiring, improvement, increase, jumps, Mother’s Day, negative, numbers, package, paying, period, preparation, proportion, rate, rebound, reported, reporting, retail, Retailers, Richard Evans, rising, sales, sector, sharp, shoppers, shopping, skilled, skilled staff, spend, spending., staff, staffing levels, stimulus, stimulus package, surveys, tendency, trend, underutilisation, unemployed, Workers, workforce, working on July 8, 2009| Leave a Comment »
Retailers are boosting staff numbers in anticipation of an improvement in consumer spending, according to the Australian Retailers Association.
The industry group’s executive director, Richard Evans, said surveys of association members showed a 12 per cent jump in employment for small and medium-sized retailers this month, painting a much more positive picture than figures released by the Australian Bureau of Statistics earlier this month.
The number of people employed in the retail sector fell by less than 0.1 per cent last month compared with February, on a seasonally adjusted basis, but the ABS also reported an increase in underutilisation—the proportion of the workforce that is either unemployed or not working as many hours as it would like.
The rate of underutilisation among female workers was 9.1per cent last month, compared with 6.4 per cent for men, which the ABS attributed to the larger proportion of women working in industries with high levels of casual employment, such as retail.
However, Mr Evans said most retailers were holding on to skilled staff in preparation for rising demand, with 68 per cent reporting no change in employment levels in the past quarter.
“A further 16 per cent of retailers actually increased their number of staff during the same period,” he said.
“Retailing works in cycles, and although the sector has experienced a downturn, good retailers are doing their best to hold on to skilled staff as consumer confidence continues to grow and a new type of consumer emerges.”
The same trend was in play among the bigger retailers, with David Jones boosting staffing levels around the Mother’s Day shopping period after the delivery of the federal government’s fiscal stimulus package in April led to a sharp rebound in sales.
Mr Evans said the stimulus package and lower interest rates meant most consumers had more cash available to spend, but “negative and fear-filled commentary” had fuelled a tendency among consumers to cut discretionary spending in favour of saving or paying off debt.
This meant shoppers would be in a better position to spend when confidence picks up again—with the ARA forecasting an improvement as soon as the September quarter.
Source : www.careerone.com.au
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