“Did you find everything you were looking for?”

It’s 5pm Saturday evening.

You’ve just walked through your front door for the last time after three trips from the car to the kitchen balancing your keys, mobile and four carrier bags in each hand.

The first trip saw you drop your keys and the second saw a bag split. This time you’ve successfully navigated those small, but important, steps from outside to in.

After kicking the door closed, thus balancing on one leg which serves to remind you of the state you got yourself into after a night on the town last Saturday, you carefully throw everything you’ve just bought into their new homes on your shelves and in your cupboards, pushing all the tins you’d forgotten you already had to the back to gather yet more dust.

But only at this point is it you realise you forgot the one and only thing you went shopping with the actual intention not to forget.

We’ve all been there whether it be milk, bread or this week’s edition of OK Magazine.

What if though, God forbid, there was a solution to this problem? What if, there was someone who could ask a simple question at the end of your trek around the supermarket? “Hello Sir/Madam, did you find everything you were looking for today?”

Yet, here lies the problem. And it’s a problem I like to describe as ‘British.’

When Barbara picks up your banana, places it on the scales and engages in conversation as she has to reset them for the third time this hour, and asks“Hello Sir/Madam, did you find everything you were looking for today?” We see an opportunity.

Not an opportunity to quickly realise we’ve left our bottle of red on the bottom shelf of the stand in the Italian aisle, perfectly placed to subconsciously pair it with our spaghetti and meatballs and ultimately put an extra tenner in our basket when you forget about it at the till (who knew supermarkets would use such dirty tactics?)

Nor do we use this to quickly revise our shopping list in our heads and tick off the list.

We smell an opportunity to try and make Barbara’s mundane day behind a checkout just that little bit better. Which never ends well.

“No, I didn’t actually Barbara.” (From personal experience, let me tell you there’s nothing more disturbing than a complete stranger glancing at your name badge and using your actual real name in an actual real life conversation.)

“I didn’t find the winning lottery ticket.”

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