Meijer Cart Flow Analysis
Tracking Indoor vs. Outdoor Shopping Carts Over Time
My name is David Frison. I was a part-time cart attendant at Rivertown Market from 2/15 to 3/22 while studying data analysis/data science. I wanted to know: The Average carts in each area per hour, Maximum/minimum carts found at each location, The hourly ratio of carts that are outside vs. available vs. in use, The best times to prioritize carts vs other tasks.
From Thursday to Sunday, I worked consistently for six hours each evening, from 2 PM to 8 PM. On Monday, my shift started earlier at 11 AM and ended at 4:30 PM. These are the time periods during which I collected the data.
I recorded the data in a notebook, logging the number of carts found at each location along with the time of recording. Some gaps exist in the data due to other urgent tasks. Please note that I was unable to track the times and number of carts collected by coworkers.
Lot C had the fewest carts recorded, while Lot B had the most.
The average carts outside are consistent until 6PM. This peak aligns with the times I took my 30-minute lunch.
The average number of available carts peak at 12PM then begin to decrease until 4PM before slowly recovering.
The maximum number of carts found in each location trend upwards from 12PM to 6 PM.
The highest number of available carts recorded was 45 at 12 PM, while the lowest was 24 at 4 PM.
Assuming that there are 70 useable carts at Rivertown Market, the average amount of carts in use increases from 24 at 12PM, to 42 at 4PM before slowly decreasing.
The correlation between available carts and carts in use is -77% correlated. This means that when availability increases, usage decreases significantly.
The behavior of carts change depending on the actual number of useable carts.
The average available carts throughout the week varies greatly depending on the day.
Saturday has the highest variability between all the days throughout the week.
Friday has the highest average of available carts as compared to other days.
Sunday has the lowest number of carts available throughout the day as compared to other days.
Proposed Change
Prioritizing cart collection from 2 PM to 6 PM will help maintain a high number of available carts during peak hours. Handling other tasks—such as trash removal, bottle area cleanup, and recycling bin changes before 2 PM will allow cart attendants to focus on cart management with fewer interruptions.