The situation is exemplary for customer safety but unfavourable for maintaining the cooling chain: closing time in the supermarket, full checkout belts, hungry office workers returning home. Then, the fire alarm goes off in the Frankfurt branch of a large supermarket chain – followed by an urgent call to evacuate the building. Within minutes, the customers leave the store. They leave behind shopping trolleys and baskets filled to the brim with fresh salad and frozen pizzas. It is unlikely that too many customers will continue shopping after the end of the (fortunately harmless) firefighting operation.

Instead, the ubiquitous vans of local delivery services have long been parked in front of the building. The market is located on the ground floor of a large, modern residential complex. And the residents have now organised the dinner they left behind when the discounter was evicted elsewhere.

Living directly above a large shopping centre provides tenants with the charming convenience of being able to wheel their full shopping trolley from the checkout directly to their kitchen without barriers. Judging by the numerous, roughly waist-high dents on the walls in the stairwell and lift, they are happy to take advantage of this. Just not on this evening. But there are alternatives.

After all, the dozens of Lieferando cars, Amazon vans and Volt cargo bikes that pile up in front of the entrances to the apartment complex every day have long been part of everyday life for the busy tenants. Books and technology, clothes and toys: Instead of fiddling a trip to the department stores into their busy schedules, they order online for all they're worth. The lament about the downsides of the gig economy is as old as the founding of Amazon.

However, one small detail is baffling: The frequency with which home delivery vans from the same supermarket chain whose ground floor branch is open almost around the clock park in front of the stairwells. This is perfectly understandable in the event of illness or disability. Still, in this affluent Frankfurt neighbourhood, it gives the impression that some residents are simply taking the delivery service game to the last level. Why lug the vegetables and crates of water up from the ground floor when a service provider can do it? It doesn't matter to customers that the milk carton isn't brought from the chiller cabinet within walking distance but from a distant central warehouse. Even if they were annoyed just a short time ago when they were winding their way through the armada of vans to the underground car park in their SUVs. Convenience is king. The only problem is that many parcel services leave their deliveries for absent tenants in the foyer of the stairwell. That is, you guessed it: On the ground floor.