In April 2023 an Edeka supermarket in Buxheim near Memmingen opened a Ratschkasse, a chat checkout, for customers who want to talk while they pay. Bavaria’s health minister, Klaus Holetschek, launched it. It was open four days a week, for two hours each morning. A market in Schweinfurt had set up a Smalltalk-Kasse almost two months earlier. In 2024 a Rewe and an Edeka in Kempten followed with Plauderkassen, chat checkouts on Wednesdays and Thursdays from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m..
Towns do the same with benches. In June 2022 the mayor of Esslingen set up a Schwätzbänkle, a bench for chatting, on the Innere Brücke. In July 2026 Nuremberg announced a Blauderbänkla in its southern cemetery. A sign on the bench suggests topics, among them the weather. The press reported the checkouts in Buxheim and Kempten as measures against loneliness.