Experience at Big Bazaar

I recently ended up in Food Bazaar at Big Bazaar on a Sunday morning (don’t ask me why I did such a stupid thing). In simple words, the place was a disaster.
There were 8 counters for billing, of which only 3 were operational, that too on a weekend. Needless to say, there were long (at least 20 minute) queues at each counter. One would assume that only 3 counters were operational in such a situation cause of lack of staff. But that didn’t seem to be the reason. There were 3 people at each counter – one for doing the actual work, one for standing and looking at it (I couldn’t make out if that person was a supervisor or a trainee), and one for bagging and locking the bags.
There was a guard at the exit to check our bags and bill to guard against shop lifting. Of course, he did a lousy job like all guards who check bags do. However, his job was not really necessary as the bags were well locked.
What I don’t understand is that why is so much precaution required to ward against shop lifting. As long as you ensure that every person is going through a billing counter, the need to lock bags and then again check them goes away. People going out empty handed can have a separate exit with some form of checking. If you don’t need to lock bags, you can do away with one person kept for bagging / locking. Customers can bag their items themselves (that’s what I saw happening in Italy). I think any customer would be happy to bag their items on their own if it halves their waiting time in the queue!
A short visit to the upper floor on Big Bazaar revealed an equally sorry state. Only one counter open, a 15 minute queue, one additional person sitting idle at the billing counter who could have started folding/bagging earlier than she did. Add to that, lack of proper bar codes leading to further delays.
Shorter queues would prompt more customers. My reason for not going to Big Bazaar is primarily the long waiting time. Of course, if they want to be more innovative they could open one counter for people with less than 4 items. That ways, even people with a smaller shopping list might be willing to shop there. I have often kept down a chocolate at Big Bazaar simply because the queue was too long.