Large retail chains like Costco, Trader Joe’s, QuikTrip and Mercadona pay wages and benefits considered high for their industries. They also use four key operational strategies:

1. Minimize:Give customers fewer choices by limiting products and promotions. That cuts costs and allows staff to develop deeper knowledge about what the company does offer.

2. Cross-train:Heavily cross-train workers so staff can take on other roles in times of low demand, like having the fruit-and-vegetable specialist restock shelves in another department when foot traffic is slow.

3. Staff: Give staff breathing space to offer better customer service and suggest operational improvements by ensuring employees are not overloaded.

4. Standardize: Standardize tasks and processes and empower staff to make decisions for which behavior is hard to prescribe, like how to respond to customer problems and complaints.

For more on how well-paying businesses make it work on the floor and at the bank, check back next week for Steven Yoder’s blog, “The Four Commandments of the Good-Jobs Strategy.” Sign up for our newsletter, and we’ll email you when it’s available online.