Retail management often loves to create rules that sound efficient on paper, but make zero sense in practice.

When one supervisor banned case scanning to “improve accuracy,” his team decided to give him a real-time demonstration of how counterproductive that rule actually was.

You’ll want to read on for this one!

Scan every item individually. Okay, boss.

I once worked at a big box retail store where management loved making up random rules to boost productivity.

The boss came up with what he thought was a brilliant idea — and he wasn’t about to let anyone question it.

One day, our floor supervisor decided we were no longer allowed to scan full cases of items — we had to scan each individual unit, even if there were 24 identical cans in the box. His reason? Inventory accuracy.

I pointed out that the system already accounted for cases properly and that this would slow down stocking. He just said, “Don’t care, one at a time. That’s an order.”

But in practice, this idea just slowed everything down.

We began doing it his way, and it went well because we didn’t really get a lot of the same items that day.

However, on my next shift, I got a pallet of canned corn — 96 cans in 4 large cases. I cracked open every case, scanned each can one at a time, and placed them carefully on the shelf like I was arranging fine china.

It took me about 40 minutes to do what normally takes 10 minutes. I did this for every similar item the whole day.

It started having detrimental effects on the store.

By lunch, the backroom was a disaster. The line of carts waiting to be stocked had tripled, and other departments were short-staffed because people had to come help us.

By the end of the day, the supervisor was fuming. “Why is this taking so long?”

I reminded him what he said. “I’m just following your order exactly.”

So when he presses his boss on it one more time, he finally gives up.

He tried to backpedal, but I asked if he wanted it in writing that I should ignore his previous instruction. He dropped it.

By the next day, the rule was gone. We were back to scanning cases.

Turns out, the employee knew best in this situation.

Redditors chime in with their thoughts.

Managers don’t always have the best ideas.

Some workplace “rules” are just downright superstitious.

Most inventory systems are designed to already account for the things this supervisor was trying to correct.

This commenter can’t help but feel a little nostalgic.

The best part about this story? This employee didn’t break a single rule!

By the next morning, the boss’s grand idea had vanished faster than a clearance sale.

If you liked that story, check out this post about an oblivious CEO who tells a web developer to “act his wage”… and it results in 30% of the workforce being laid off.