Overdue Idea: The ultimate shopping app (for people who hate shopping)

THE ISSUE: You’re a do-it-yourselfer, so when the middle shelf on the bookcase collapses, you put on your hammerin’ jeans and aim the Odyssey at the nearest big box hardware store.

You hit the floor looking for the specialty shelf peg that you know must be hiding somewhere within the airline-hanger size space, certain you’ll be home in time for “Walking Dead”.

The clerks have their invisibility cloaks on, but the signs lead you to furnishings. You find bookshelves and nightstands, but no pegs. You move on to hardware and find three aisles of nails, screws, nuts, bolts and latches.

Time ticking, you walk to the checkout and wait your turn to speak to a cashier, who directs you to aisle 125. You set off, glumly noting the line you’ll have to face when you return, and resigning yourself to catching your show when it drops on Netflix.

THE VICTIMS: Retailers have nailed the concept of putting everything you need under one roof, but matching up customer and product is still a work in progress. Of course, they want it that way, hoping you wander aisles and have a treasure hunt moment where you snap up that impossibly priced car hand vacuum.

But if you’re not a chronic browser, the lack of store maps is a major hassle. The book of Depot says the Creator invented clerks to fulfill this purpose, but somehow they always seem to be halfway up a stocking ladder or engaged by five other people when you find them.

THE FIX: Some retailers have experimented with in-store map apps, but they’re tricky to find, and people are trying to cut down on their apps these days. We need a catch-all.

The Virtual Store Clerk would recognize which store you’re in and provide exact directions to the item you’re seeking, synching with the store inventory to let you know whether you need to sprint to get the last one. Product reviews could be added as well, so you know whether it’s worth springing the extra four bucks for the mop with the metal handle.

Beyond just a simple map, you’d be able to input your shopping list before you leave home, and the app would lay out a convenient path through the store that would get you to each product in the quickest amount of time. Ultimately, you’d be able to scan your product as you buy it and pay online, allowing you to just walk right out of the store, a clerk checking out your bill Costco-style as you leave.

Why would retailers participate in something that would keep customers from wandering their aisles? Because convenience is a product, and the average Joe or Jane looking to make a surgical strike for three items that are needed ASAP will pick the store that’s going to provide the least amount of headache.

No browsing, no confusion, no lines. Ultimate do-it-yourself shopping, even if you don’t have a hope in hell of successfully putting that bookcase back together.