Years ago grocery stores had staff that would even carry bags to your car full service. Buying groceries was much more luxurious than it is today. They have been cutting costs for years now, not because they want to be greedy… They want to keep the price of goods as low as possible. Because they know that if their apples cost $0.25 more than the other guys, you will go shop at the other guys. The price does go down, however so does the purchasing power of the US dollar. So the price appears to stay the same. The other things such as cashiers and extra services disappear.