Wednesday, June 18, 2014

Grocery Store Frustration Overflows

I soloed at the local Wegman's last evening collecting the critical supplies for the house because we have been too busy to actually go shopping for the past almost two weeks. The most critical item was coffee! The day does not start without coffee.


I was amazed at the multiple frustrations that I experienced while at the store. 

Grocery stores are not organized in a manner which makes sense to me.

For instance, why are olives in three separate locations? There is an olive bar, olives in the ethnic food section, and olives in the condiments section near the oils and pickles. I'm not sure of the relationship between olives and pickles. I needed a specific kind of olives for a recipe and the employee near the olive bar looked at me as if I had two heads when I asked for Kalamata Olives. I have no clue what they are, they were just on my list. I did finally find them next to a jar of kosher pickles. That makes sense, why?

And then, there was the excursion into the salad dressing aisle. Sadly, I knew what kind of salad dressing I needed. I also knew it was there, somewhere. And I looked, and looked, and looked for it. I finally found the brand name dressing on the bottom shelf near my feet.

The final straw, or so I thought, came as I was searching for the Sierra Mist. I never found it. I had a conversation with another evening shopper and we both agreed that stores hide popular products so that we will buy something else as we search. That is not how guys work. IF Sierra Mist is on my list and I cannot find it there is no substitute and I'm not going to waste my time trying to find it either. I left without Sierra Mist or any suitable replacement. Don't force me to go on an Easter Egg Hunt for a popular product!

Finally,  I was ready to check out and get home. Not so fast! Few checkout lines were open and so there were at least one, if not two persons already in line. I soon realized why. The checkout personnel were conducting a work slow down. Each item was painfully and meticulously scanned and bagged. A short few minute checkout turned into a painfully long event compounded by the fact that I really didn't want to be there in the first place. 

I noticed the questions. Did I find everything? I responded, "yes and then some," when I really wanted to unload about the Sierra Mist and the safari for the olives. But in the interest of getting out of the store, I gave the answer which allowed me to depart the quickest. 

I thought later about the question on the ATM card machine which asks: "Is the amount OK?" Two choices are provided: Yes and No. NO--the amount is not OK, I am paying way too much for this stuff!

Someone needs to construct a grocery store that makes sense and is efficient. Although I did not require any on this trip, why is the milk and dairy in the farthest corner from the doors? It makes no sense.

-- Bob Doan, Elkridge, MD

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