7-Eleven's Classic Idea

At a 7-Eleven convenient store in Modesto, California, the owner of this establishment, Sukhi Sandhu, had noticed there had been a lack of customers in the store due to the high amount of loitering and panhandling that occurred right outside of the convenient store. As a solution to this problem, the store started playing classical music outside of the 7-Eleven to keep people from loitering and panhandling around his store. And from doing this, Sukhi Sandhu heard from his customers that people feel much safer approaching the store since he started playing the classical music. Manuel Souza stated that “once the music started, the riffraff left.” Who was a homeless person who referred to himself as part of the “riffraff”. This classical music is part of a program that 7-Eleven is using that encourages non-confrontational methods to reduce loitering.

I think that this is quite an ingenious system that works almost effortlessly to reduce the amount of panhandling and loitering without having to physically go out and tell the homeless people to leave. This also results in a safer environment for both the customers and the store workers and I hope that other 7-Elevens around California will adopt Sandhu’s discovery.