The first self-service shop

In the first Migros self-service shop, in Zurich’s Seidengasse, customers were able to take products from three racks and a chest freezer. The new system was so successful that the shop’s turnover increased by a third.

The Migros Seidengasse branch lies in the heart of Zurich, close to the department stores Jelmoli and Oscar Weber and only three minutes walk from the main train station. This privileged location makes it one of the branches with the highest turnovers. The starting position for the ”trial” planned by Migros could not be better.
On 15 March 1948, the first Migros self-service shop opens its doors in Seidengasse 12. In view of this day, the doors are divided into entrance and exit so that the customer – ”following the principle of right-hand traffic“ – is steered to make a round tour. Just after entering, the customer is handed a basket, a service that is soon done away with.
Now the customers can select the products themselves from two large free-standing shelves, a wall-shelf and a deep-freeze and put them in their baskets. Vegetables, bakery goods and meat are still offered at the counter. Payment takes place at one of five tills; next to the side till are the chocolate eggs ready for the upcoming Easter.

Two weeks after the opening, the Brückenbauer reports that only 10 to 20 percent of the customers are having difficulty with the new system, mostly children and elderly people. But there are also men who are of the opinion that they should not be expected to carry a shopping basket. The editor pointedly comments: ”To be married to such men must have its peculiarities; but it is possible that the clever Migros sales assistants will be better able to deal with such men, as their wives.”
The experiment is a huge success: Within a short time, the turnover of this first self-service shop increases by 30 percent. Die Tat, the newspaper of the Landesring der Unabhängigen, founded by Gottlieb Duttweiler, rejoices: ” Migros has once again proven that it is still youthful and adventurous.”