Supermarket Facts

25,000 grocery workers walked off the job to save the CEO their board had just fired. No union. No pay. No budging. Market Basket's board sacked Arthur T. Demoulas for paying workers too well. 71 stores emptied. Sales crashed 95% in six weeks. Customers drove past Market Basket to shop at competitors. The board folded and Arthur T. bought the company back for $1.5 billion.

A South Korean supermarket solved the "they all go brown at once" problem with one design change: packing bananas at staggered ripeness stages so one is ready today, one tomorrow, the rest progressively later in the week. The product is called Haru Hana Banana - "one a day banana." It sells for about $2.70.