This story is a sequel to Barnyard Barge-Ins
Shopping carts cost money. Nopony outside the staff at Barnyard Bargains seems to understand that. Carts are taken deep into Ponyville, repurposed for any number of activities, never seen again... and Mr. Rich is sick of buying replacements. So it couldn't hurt to use a few new magical and mundane methods of keeping them around, could it? No harm whatsoever possible?
The two-word answer: 'It's Ponyville.'
(While this story takes place after Barnyard Barge-Ins, it can be read as a stand-alone: no knowledge of those events is required.)
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Chapters (1)
*sees title*
I got that reference...
Did... did an Estee piece just have something go right for the good guys?
Did the bad guys just get their righteous desserts?
Sweet
Vengeance of the retail squad!
Funnily the wheel lock on a timer would have been enough to maybe actually work somewhat. Maybe not totally, but good enough to be marketable. And Flim and Flam where a bit willing to fight more then flight for some reason. Conning is one thing, Assault is much more serious.
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When it comes to fighting, I treat them as possums: they'd truly prefer to run and playing dead is a wonderful option on those rare occasions when it works -- but if they're cornered and believe any chase will let the pursuer catch up, they will lash out.
(There's also a chance that they're rabid.)
But while they'll bluff as much as possible and try to look bold, they won't cause fatalities if they can possibly avoid it, or even inflict permanent injuries. Ponies who've just been ripped off aren't as dedicated to seeking revenge as those who've just lost a limb or family member. You can safely consider them both to be thinking along the lines of 'render unconscious and then get away.'
I like the way you've portrayed Rich in this tale...most authors I've read have him being greedy and unscrupulous. It's a nice change! Now I'll have to read the one that preceded this one. Faved!
ah, a joyus ending if there ever was one
Nice! Flim Flam finally got what was coming to them. That ending was awesome all over. I really enjoy this characterization of Rich, he's an actual smart and ethical capitalist with sympathetic qualities. It really shows through how much he cares for all of his employees and customers. It was great to see a humble but successful business stallion go up against fraudulent narcissistic con artists.
See, it's quotes like that this that really sets Equestria apart from real life. And in particular, I think it shows how this Equestria still has that heart and inherent decency of the show. It's just really sweet and I love it.
Good writing as usual, Estee!
Question: do you write the ponies as dumber than the human race, or simply equally dumb?
Love your imagery
There internal dialogue is wonderful
The depth of the world, especially in the small mundane details
This thing has a feeling to it, old down to earth kinda feel. Maybe nostalgic or a touch sepia
Huh.... I was right
Filthy Rich and Cranky really need to have a weekly, or at least monthly, night out at Berry Punch's bar where they have a drink and talk about the stress of being two of the only sane, responsible, actual adults in this madhouse of a town.
I have reason to believe their location was unknown.
Glorious vengeance.
That's a good summary, so I'll stop there.
And then, there was suffering. No mere misery, but the sweetest schadenfreude.
That was a splendid and unexpectedly upbeat story.
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And Cheerilee. Can't forget the martyr of Ponyville.
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capitalism is inherently unethical though, as the bourgeoisie extract far more value (surplus value) from labor than labor is paid. They are able to do this because of their often violently enforced monopoly on the means of production.
Further more, capitalism is driven by consumerism and growth and imperialism, and inasmuch is currently literally destroying our planet, with unmitigated ecological and societal disasters growing worser by the day. Capitalism can hardly be called an Innocent bystander in this rape of Mother Earth and humanity. Should Equestria follow a similar path of industrialization as America, without the safeguards of socialism, it too will in time find itself in this tragic, soulless death orgy we call late stage capitalism.
( don't take this as me going off on you, take this as me using this as a teachable moment.)
Somepony has kept their lightning certification up to date.
Thanks for the fun story.
Some people have characterised your setting as being needlessly cynical, but then you write things like this: -
And there is sunshine and Rainbows.
I am rather surprised that Rich went with the deposit scheme despite realising the issues in advance, I would have thought he could have gently talked down Twilight and Rachette rather than caving. Maybe he did work out that it would work out cheaper in the long term once the original issues were worked out.
That was great! ... That ending! It's amazing! ... Feels like an off-screen death... But, teleportation is a tricky spell... And they're likely not like Twilight, who can reflexively teleport... So they're not getting away! Yay!
Lol at the reference to The Secret with "Well, it's hardly a secret."
Idea: Tracking spells, connected to a map? So useful? Impossible, or no one's thought of it yet?
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I am of the opinion that Estee's ponies are differently dumb. They are better than humans in some aspects, and worse than them in others.
Or, you could say, ponies make pony errors, just like humans make human ones.
You can find a lot of documentaries about the different failings of the human mind (Like the Brain Games series). Now think that pony minds run with a different mental system. Ponies wouldn't fall for some of the mind tricks depicted on the series, but would fall for some new tricks we would be immune to.
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With atleast a few being based on herd psychology.
oh that last line... that last line cracked me up but good... nice one mate i needed a laugh like this after the day i had... oh those poor fools are gonna regret this scheme.....
This one was a blast to read. I'm surprised Mr. Rich or Twilight didn't try just going for the wheel lock/cover lock idea--yes, there would be some ponies who wouldn't care, but there can't be THAT many ponies who use carts as planters or books as doorstops... surely not ALL of the culprits...right?
Well, that's one heck of a hook.
Oh dear. Green magic and multiple inventors? This... this will not end well.
Yeah, arcane intelligence is going to be tricky in the extreme. Not exactly something one can just throw together on a whim; it'll likely take layer upon layer of further magical refinements and automation before it'll be possible outside of thaumic fiction.
Hmm. Bit of a mixed bag in terms of turnout. Depends on whether you're looking at short-, medium-, or long-term. But the long-term? Yeah. I'd be very surprised indeed if the brothers find a way to weasel out of this one. Magnificent tale. Thank you for it. I hope it helped you given your current situation.
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Considering the world set up by both the show and Estee has the mediating influence of the Princesses to stop total greed and power from taking over, I don't think that will happen. There's already evidence in Mark of Appeal that shows how Celestia went to great lengths to stop railroads from destroying the environment after they were invented.
Equestria's gonna be ok. Herd influence is so strong there that even if there were some powerful and greedy tycoons out there trying to ruin the planet, the majority wouldn't go along with it.
8333365
... We weren't supposed to laugh at that? My bad.
8333690
With the wheel lock I guess it depends how well the 'not locking if being brought back' side works. If it doesn't that you end up with more ponies using trollies as planters and door stops because they can't be bothered to get the nearly immobile things back to the store after it froze.
If they can be returned it might work better, but it could also depend how sensitive the system is, what if the route you need to use to get them back to the store requires you to go further away and loop around? Does it freeze up then?
Given the brothers were going to steal everything in a few days they didn't really need to think this through.
A little something new decorated the wall of Barnyard Bargains the next month.
i.gyazo.com/a3d92a3fc283966db61d5e5a96a2359b.png
8333460 The deposit scheme works almost perfectly here. All of the major stores (and minor ones) constantly have loose carts out in the parking lot *except* Aldi. And when the Kansas wind kicks up to a stiff breeze (what other states might call a tornado, but here we know better), the other stores all go running around, trying to gather their chrome sheep before they bang off cars.
It's probably because we're so cheap. Pulling into the Aldi parking lot and seeing a loose cart is a free quarter. Ka-ching!
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Oh, yes, the deposit works well enough in the real world (most major supermarkets around here use it, the biggest problem recently has been the introduction of new £1 coins a few months ago which don't fit into the current coin slots my local Sainsbury's uses, no idea when they're going to update but the older coins are starting to get quite rare now). It's just that Filthy obviously saw the short term problems its introduction would cause but seemed to be unable to resist the combined cuteness of Twilight and Rachette.
Great story Estee. We get to see Mr. Rich at his best again, and it looks like those two crooks are finally going to be caught.
I've used one of those quarter things once. When it got stuck an employee let me borrow a quarter to fix it. I haven't seen how they work long term, but it was nice to see them again in this story.
8333365
I'm not sure this counts as a "teachable moment" since it only has a tangential relation to the subject being discussed. Still, I think you could have done a better job making your case.
Ideally, in a capitalist exchange both parties are getting more than they put in.
Person A: I got this guy to wash my car and all I had to give him was 20 bucks. Sucker.
Person B: I got this guy to give me 20 bucks and all I had to do was wash his car. Sucker.
Now, this is the ideal rather than what always happens, but you have to either explain why even this is "inherently unethical" despite both parties being better off than before, or you have to explain why it always erodes (e.g. becomes cronyism and monopoly) when socialism doesn't. Furthermore, you say that the problem is "the bourgeoisie . . . violently enforced monopoly on the means of production", yet to, say, a libertarian, that sounds like an excellent description of the government. A violently enforced monopoly. Is there a reason why making it easier for more people to access the means of production wouldn't also solve the problem?
I don't have any context for what you mean by "imperialism" or "stage capitalism", so I'm not going to touch on those at the moment. You also seem to claim growth is a bad thing. Since trees do this all the time, I think this requires a little more elaboration.
The best part of your argument comes when you are talking about "ecological and societal disasters growing worser by the day". First off, worser isn't a word. Second, you are right that corporations do things like pollute cities and waters, chop down forests, and sometimes purchase items created through slave labor, and these are all problems. The thing is, there exist options that don't contribute to these problems, they just cost more, and most Americans don't care enough about the long term to be willing to pay more. Case in point:
You can bet that if people actually cared, businesses would trip over themselves proving that they use the methods customers want. Now, it's possible that there is a correlation between consumerist attitudes and capitalist societies, and this could mean that such societies cause people to stop caring, but how do you know that it's not the other way around, that selfish attitudes cause a more capitalist society to form, or that both are caused by a third factor? In either of these cases, switching to a more socialist society would merely treat the symptom, not the cure, assuming the symptom got treated at all. If the ingredients are bad, merely changing the recipe won't do any good.
Can you explain these points?
8333365
Can you prove this is the case?
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8334086
One of the things which set this story off was a local supermarket's abandonment of the deposit system. I listed a few of the problems which crop up with such carts in the story, but I don't believe any of them are the central reason for stripping the coin boxes off every last handle. As best I can determine, it came down to two factors.
* Near-sociopathic cart wrangler.
As Georg said, when you see a loose cart, it's a free quarter. However, to a cart wrangler, that's their bonus pay. The intelligent ones realize they can't reach every cart and if someone's just parked next to a loose one, they're probably going to get their hands on it first. However, this particular supermarket had one employee who had basically turned himself into the Cart Police. If you even got near his precious charges, he would probably threaten to kill you. He had a few very loud words with me once, right up until the moment I informed him that I'd recorded every last one of them.
But he's still there, so I don't think it was entirely the One Last Incident, not with a customer. (He's currently moping a lot.) The problem was at least partially due to:
* Night scavengers.
The supermarket is a 24/7 model: they close on Christmas, and -- that's pretty much it. The cart wranglers, however, are generally only at work during the day. At the most, they'll go until nine in the evening, and then don't come in again until seven in the morning. This means loose carts are theoretically free for the taking.
And my area's local homeless population looked at that parking lot, perceived free money, and set up something of a turf war.
You would see people sleeping on the benches outside the store. When they were awake, they would be roaming the lots, trying to reach those carts. If you took your eyes off one which you'd just unloaded, it probably wouldn't be there when you finally glanced back. I just about had one ripped out of my hands as a wild-eyed man informed me that "You've been beat!", after which I named every last one of them Ben Beat. And they competed for the right to scavenge. Sometimes one would lose and vanish. They might return a few months later. Or you could never see them again. A few were quiet about it, others were highly aggressive, and the shifting encampment was permanent.
When you're homeless and claiming carts... well, there are worse things to do in the night for money. And I think the store had a policy of ignoring them, unless something bad were to happen.
And then at least one of them started openly competing with the day shift.
I can't say what happened. I just know I saw one roaming the lot during the same hours Sir Psychopath operated. And shortly after, the coin boxes were being stripped off the carts.
So the local homeless population has moved out. And the carts? Are everywhere. No one returns them to the stalls, because there's no longer any incentive to do so. The wranglers have lost their extra income. And somewhere, someone's gone hungry because that dollar burger is now out of reach.
However, carts are still being happily 'borrowed' as people wheel their groceries home. Many are never returned. There's one sitting in a driveway a few blocks away, and it's been there since winter. The same cart. A coin-box model, which still has a quarter in it.
It used to be petty theft. Now it's a museum display. Behold the last of its kind...
The same supermarket also tried out the invisible wheel-lock fence. There were two problems with that: the carts still had one wheel free at all times and could be stunt-driven, and the lock tended to kick in about six yards from your car.
Hmm... If Mr. Rich gave a discount for those who use the chained carts, they might work...
And it wouldn't be a net profit loss, perhaps, as then he's not losing carts any more and therefore not having to spend money and raise prices to cover the loss of carts...
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Huh, that might work, or something like it. You don't even need the coin carts, just have someone give a customer a coupon when they bring a cart back into the store, whether it's after a minute or a day. That way, you both encourage cart return and repeat shopping.
The Flim Flam brothers fall short of greatness: Self-loading carts would be extremely valuable for anyone without a horn. The spell should require a periodic reloading with a coded spell. When customers spend over a certain amount of bits at the store, their cart will retain the enchantment for a particular amount of time. 1 Day for basic shopping, a week for the equivalent of $100, and $300 gets a full month's charge.
Bonus points for a necklace that makes the cart follow the appropriate user when they are in a specified range - or stop if it gets too close.
Get yer self shopping carts here, just attatch yer list and an account number into which you put yer bits and it will head through town to check the prices then return, picking up the cheapest stuff on the way.
8333025
Dear author, I take deep offense!
The glorious possum is not a rabies carrier!
Flim and Flam, on the other hand...
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I'm not sure if Cheri, Redheart, or Miranda Rights gets that award in Estee's ponyville. I am sure the three of them probably meet up for mimosas and Crusader war stories over brunch.
8333365
Cough. As an Actual Business Owner (tm) and petit bourgeois, let me 'splain the value I add to the process:
(i) Those means of production? WelI, it's the rare non-self-employed laborer who owns all their own tools and equipment (or, for that matter, who wants to borrow enough money to buy 'em, and maintain 'em, and make sure they pass all inspectable standards, and replace 'em when they break, and...) But if you really want to relieve me of all those depreciating, illiquid assets and ongoing repair and maintenance costs in exchange for a salary increase, I'm open to negotiation.
and
(ii) I take all the financial risk. If I'm employing you, and the business goes under, you stop getting paid but are otherwise unencumbered. So do I - but I am also left with all the business's debts to pay off, for example, and miscellaneous stuff to dispose of somehow (often at more expense), and assorted other troubles.
Now I'm on something like business #5 at the moment, so I obviously have no problem with this, but I do beg to point out that self-employment is an option available to everyone. That so few people actually take it up, I suspect, tells you exactly how much appetite labor has in practice for taking over that part of the business, however much cutting out the middleman would gain it...
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Bravo.
Anyone who has looked more than briefly at starting a business, self-employed, will soon understand that such are viewed by the local, state, and federal governments in much the same way rabbits are viewed by wolves. Add to that operating expenses and enough income left over to pay one's rent and put food on the table, and all of a sudden working for a corporate employer who provides vacations and real (as opposed to 0-Care) health insurance looks pretty darn good.
8334976
Hey, you.
At least Filthy isn't fishing the bloody things out of the local river. Lucky bastard.
An amusing entry in the ongoing series. Two big hooves up.
"Ponies of all three species had occasionally tried rearing up on their hind legs, bracing the fore against the cart, and pushing the thing along minotaur-style: for all but Lyra, the long-term assumption of the unnatural position typically ended with hooves slipping, a chin smacking into wood,"
And, occasionally, Pinkie Pie. When she isn't, say, sitting in the cart and sculling it with an oar (somehow) around the store.
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We had a weird case locally. We had two major chain in Australia for quite a while until Aldi (Aldi Sud I think if you will forgive my lack of umlat) entered the market and they use the coinbox system. Except they use the AUD$2 coin, the largest denomination coin (I think that's at least partly because of coin size. The 20c and 50c pieces are rather wide). So both Coles and Woolworths (the pre-existing major players) decide to copy Aldi and introduce the coin boxes. That lasted for about six months and then suddenly they vanished again.
I have a feeling that the trolley collectors suddenly saw their jobs vanishing and complained. Most of them now use some variation of the wheel lock system depending on exactly where they are located (standalone and anchors for small local shopping strips vs those located in major shopping centres who have to co-ordinate with other stores on what to use... including their main competitors). Aldi stores stuck with the coin and chain system and as a general rule are much better about not having stray shopping trolleys occupying concrete islands and parking bays.
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Yes, who is this and what did they do to Estee?
It's interesting the way this went backwards. The coin lock mechanism was invented long before the automatic wheel lock in the real world.
Collecting shopping trolleys is half my job, so I have some perspective here that many of your readers don't.
The coin mechanism does its job well most of the time, and significantly reduces the number of thefts. The biggest problem is when the mechanism doesn't work or when customers do the wrong thing with it (usually in good faith). In Australia, they usually accept $1 and $2 coins, with a slot for each, but some people like to put a smaller $2 coin in the larger $1 slot but it doesn't work and is hard to get out; or they put a larger (UK)£1 coin in the $1 slot and it gets stuck even harder. Possibly the worst of it is the trolley token that Aldi sells; it works fine in Aldi's trolleys, but because it is slightly smaller than a $2 coin, it becomes difficult to pinch out of the trolleys from the other big supermarkets (and doesn't unlock the trolley anyway).
Most stores in the supermarket chain I work for are moving to using wheel locks that trigger as soon as you leave the carpark; I just wish my store would get them sooner or later, but it might as well be years away.
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This mostly applies to the United States, where worker salaries have effectively remained static for the last 30 years, while productivity has spiked uncontrollably thanks to extensive automation. Only thing that has kept natural economic inflation from causing widespread famine is the prevalence of big bulk retailers like Wall-Mart, who can keep their prices low enough to satisfy the vast underpaid working class, meaning they see more and more business while less competitive retailers are simply bought up or go out of business, creating a semi-vicious cycle as less and less money re-enters the economy to be spent, with only a few major retailers able to compete for consumers diminishing wallets. The same can not be said for all other goods and services a worker-slash-citizen needs, such as education, healthcare, housing... Needless to say this is not a sustainable system and is the greatest failing of Trickle Down Economics to date.
Homeless people keep stealing carts.
To prevent this, all the homeless should be devoured by a morbidly obese fox lady.
A certain miniscule fraction of the reading population will know to what this refers. The rest will ponder in hesitantly uncertain (and highly thematically redundant) trepidation as to whether or not they should attempt to look it up.