It should have been three minutes.
In, collect, pay, out.
Tuesday morning, just after ten. The pharmacy next to the bakery, the one with the green cross that flickers slightly. Three people ahead of me. One of them holding a paper ticket, even though the machine wasn’t turned on.
That was the first clue.
No one really knew where the queue started. It wasn’t a line, more a loose half-circle. People edging forward when they felt it was their turn, then hesitating, then stepping back again. Small movements, but they add up.
By the time I got inside, it had already been eight or nine minutes.
This isn’t unusual. It just isn’t usually broken down. We say “there was a queue” and leave it there, when most of the delay happens before anything actually gets processed.
You see the same thing on repeat errands, especially ones people do half on autopilot. It builds quietly, like it did in the trolley and pharmacy run test, where the time wasn’t in the distance but in the stops, the pauses, the tiny resets
https://www.newcitiesfoundation.org/mum-the-trolley-and-the-pharmacy-run-marina-alta-5/
At the counter, it shifted.
The woman ahead asked for something simple. The pharmacist turned, took two steps back, opened a drawer, closed it again, then crossed to the other side. Not inefficient exactly, just not set up for reach.
That added another couple of minutes.
Then the overlap. Not chatter for the sake of it, just conversations running into each other. One person still finishing while the next had already stepped forward. No clear break between transactions.
No one’s fault. But it stretches everything.
By the time I paid, it had been twenty-two minutes.
Nothing went wrong. That’s the point.
If you stood back and looked at it on paper, it would pass. One counter, steady flow, no major bottlenecks. But in real use, the time leaks out in small places:
• not knowing where to stand
• items just out of reach
• no clear “you’re next” moment
None of these need a system overhaul.
A strip of tape on the floor would probably fix the first. Moving five products closer would fix the second. A slight pause between customers would fix the third.
The difference between three minutes and twenty-two isn’t volume.
It’s all the bits no one’s measuring.