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Comment by kube-system | Hacker News Reader

Looking back, it's really amazing how the 24/7 economy has slowly taken over. Could you imagine someone running a grocery store today that wasn't open on the weekend?

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A new experience for me since I moved from California to Amsterdam: A local shop where we often buy vegetables closed for the entire month of August, with a hand written note on the window. In September they were open again.

Italians do this kind of thing as well.

I learned this the hard way, dont vacation in Italy in August. All the local restaurants are closed as their owners are vacationing! That actually made me reassess my own beliefs about life balance.

How was your dining experience?

> Could you imagine someone running a grocery store today that wasn't open on the weekend?

Something I learned as a result of covid was that normal Chinese practice is to go to the grocery store every day so that you can prepare a meal from fresh ingredients.

Obviously under such circumstances it wouldn't be possible for grocery stores to be regularly closed over the weekends. That idea has to result from the mass individual storage of large quantities of food, which is interesting in its own right.

My impression is that many people in Northern Europe are also used to going to the grocery store every day, at least to get specific things where freshness makes a big difference. Very different from what I'm used to in the United States!

Lot of lines became pretty blurry in the recent few decades. Lots of business target the “off time”. Lots of companies offer or run non-traditional schedules where employees are off on “work days”. And finally, saying “we’re closed for the holidays” - which ones? It’s becoming less clear with so many cultures in the mix.

So yes, 24/7 became the norm. And it’s ok if people get paid fairly and are willing to do it. On a side note, I do miss the old simpler days.

With dual income M-F 7AM to 6PM working households becoming common, I assume there would be significant demand outside of those hours for non work activities.

The interesting part would be if grocery stores start charging more for evening/weekend/overnight hours.

When I was young, 70's early 80's, in the country I grew up in stores were closed on Sunday. Impossible to imagine now.

I don't remember many stores being open on Sunday back in the 90s where I was from in the US. Heck, the US still has some blue laws floating around.

https://www.kxnet.com/news/local-news/no-more-blue-laws-stor...

Stores are closed on Sundays in Germany. People just plan around it.

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