By Kate Fowler
Internet Culture & Trends Reporter
A Walmart employee has given social media a behind-the-scenes glimpse at what it takes to rearrange the aisles, and customers have been left shocked.
Tammy Turley gained over 7 million views on a TikTok video showing her Walmart branch's workforce pushing the aisles along on wheels, complete with items still sat upon the shelves.
"POV: You finally figured out where everything is in the grocery store," she wrote on-screen. One clip even showed a worker transporting a whole shelf full of jars and bottled goods, guided by another worker.
Rearranging items is reportedly a common tactic used by companies to ensure customers spend as much time as possible in stores, and ultimately find more products to buy.
@tammylynnturley It was here the last I shopped! #DisneyPlusVoices #groceryshopping #foryoupage #fyp #work #push*t
♬ Monkeys Spinning Monkeys - Kevin MacLeod & Kevin The Monkey
After arriving at a shop they frequent often, only to find every item in a whole new location, a customer is forced to walk down more aisles in order to find their products. The hope here is that while doing so, customers will stop and find other products to buy, which they hadn't planned on purchasing before.
This tactic is one of the many used by stores to keep customers in the store. Brain-scan experiments by Paul Mulins at Bangor University in the UK found that after around 40 minutes, most customers tend to begin emotionally shopping rather than rationally shopping, making them more likely to purchase objects they didn't intend to.
@tammylynnturley Reply to @helfan0395
♬ original sound - Tammy Lynn Turley
Turley confirmed that the main objective of moving the shelves was to clean the floors, which previously had marks left on from the units, with rectangles darker than the rest. "We only move them for these beautiful floors," she said in a recent video, showing the newly cleaned flooring.
Another video showed workers moving the shelves, as another shouted out instructions, leading viewers to compare the scene to a football team.
"Not me thinking they individually rearranged all the items," commented one user.
"I don't know how I thought they rearranged stores but this was not it," wrote a TikTok viewer.
"Y'all are the reason my mother shouted at me when i couldn't 'find' the towels as a kid, when i knew where they were before" added another.
One customer noted that, "Now I'm going to think twice when getting mad at a worker when they say they don't know where something is."
"After an argument about an item my husband couldn't find he said, '"well the whole aisle didn't just get up and move' - yes sir, yes it did," joked another.
Uncommon Knowledge
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Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
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