People who don't bag their own groceries are the most irredeemable scoundrels

Making the cashier bag your shit at busy times of day

Ah, I try not to go grocery shopping after say, 8 a.m.

I really don't think I've ever seen anyone help a cashier with the bagging. I'm going to have to start paying attention to this.

i bag my own stuff at tj's because they let you, other supermarkets in LA usually don't like this, the minute you start someone comes running over.

New name for the Republic of Ireland?

We do have a rubbish health care system, though, so we're not that un-American.

how does the "you should help bag your groceries or you're an asshole" argument intersect with the "if you use the automatic checkout lanes you're an asshole" argument? seems like if you do the bagging, you're allowing cashiers to help more customers, thus making additional staffing seem less necessary, thus depriving potential workers of jobs, just like when you use the automatic checkout lanes. whereas if you don't help with bagging and the lines get really long, managers will see they risk losing customers unless they hire more cashiers

People being lazy make my groceries more expensive.

The real assholes are the ones who leave their shopping carts scattered around the parking lot.

The "we have to make it worse before it gets better" argument is never really a good idea in human cost, though, is it? People who refuse to tip waitstaff b/c "it's the establishment's responsibility to pay them" vs people who want to let public schools turn into un-funded holding cells so they can pressure the system? NAGL.

Here it depends on the supermarket. Some bag, some don't. It even depends on the cashier.

I would say I help out with the bagging but the cashier does about 2/3 of it. Because the cashier is way faster than me and the cashier's bags are always much better packed than mine. I do it out of a sense of duty to keep the line moving but I'm always annoyed about the poor arrangement of the bags I packed myself.

I'll help bag after I pay, but I'm watching that scanner and the price screen like a hawk before then. I'm not going to get charged for two bags of dog food or the wrong price on a special because I was sacking my own beans.

― http://tinyurl.com/vroooo0ooooom (Pleasant Plains), Monday, March 28, 2011 10:20 PM (21 minutes ago) Bookmark

^^

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20100227205505AAMQXrb

I'm so confused by the cashier who thinks that taxpayers pay her minimum wage.

yeah around here the baggers are right on top of things, if you bag your own they shove you out of the way and smack you with a sack of potatoes

yahoo answers, you are a traet

If I'm in a restaurant and see my food waiting on the counter, I usually give the waiter a break and just go get it myself. I know where the condiments are and everything.

Why make that couple who just walked in wait to order just because I'm too lazy to get up and get something myself?

sorry, i mean YOU are A TREAT

What is this improbable un-American fairy-land??

We have Aldi here in Chicago, and you have to buy bags — but groceries are super cheap.

i'm not reading this thread because obviously but publix has baggers so it's all cool, more jobs and such -- you aren't allowed to tip them tho

I think I started bagging my own foodz only in NY because the baggers ALWAYS have a bowl out for tips, and I always kind of got the impression that it was an "extra" service and if I let them help me, I would be obligated to tip, and I would just rather not enter into that social contract for additional money, if that's okay...?

If I'm in a restaurant and see my food waiting on the counter, I usually give the waiter a break and just go get it myself. I know where the condiments are and everything.

Why make that couple who just walked in wait to order just because I'm too lazy to get up and get something myself?

'cause waiting in line in the supermarket is just as much fun as sitting in a restaurant. hmmm wonder what supermarket line i will visit with my s.o. next valentine's day?

one of those aldi's is opening up near my office. wtf is it.

I intentionally buy large and awkward items because I enjoy seeing them struggle. Is it cruel? Perhaps.

cheap off brand goods xp

Waiting for food in a restaurant can be more annoying than waiting in line at the grocery store. Maybe not on St. Freaking Valentine's Day, but on a lunch break, sure.

I pretty much don't trust checkout people to bag my shopping properly, last time I tried it I ended up with someone half-arsedly chucking several bottles of wine on top of a box of eggs.

is this aldi stuff quality?

I have absolutely nothing to say on this topic.

But if the fake posters from the "super-ILXor" thread actually started their own threads, this would be one of them.

I'm super-concerned with price accuracy as well; I've learned to strategically sequence my items on the conveyor belt so that even the most idiotic, thoughtless cashier can stack things correctly.

Yeah I put the heavy stuff at the front and save the light but bulky and/or fragile items for last. But a cashier can still let things accumulate at the end and grab any old item.

In most UK shops/supermarkets you bag your own shopping, but if the cashier bags the items as they scan them I let them, otherwse I'm just getting in their way

(I have no car so I am generally only buying at most 2 bagfuls of shopping anyway, in which case there isn't much room for multitasking)

Aldi is v good for stereotypically German things such as cured meats and chocolate imo. but I am not buying fresh veg there again after last time I bought a broccoli which was full of mystery dead bugz which I didn't notice when I washed it

People who use the self-checkout stands for an entire cartload of groceries are even more irredeemable scoundrels, IMO.

I use Aldi for really cheap cereal and pasta stuff, have never bought fresh things from them. I think it varies from store to store though — the one closest by me is kind of dingy-looking, but there's another one on the north side of town that looks like Ikea for food.

Figures this thread would start with a smug Trader Joe's shopper.

At my local grocery if you bag your own they stop you and say "that's what I'm here for."

This dilemma seems totally foreign to me. At the stores I go to, either a bagger is expected at the end of the lane, or there will be a bagging apparatus on a carousel right next to the register, so that the cashier can easily bag the items during the scanning process. In my travels, this seems to be the general way of the modern American grocery store. I don't have a Trader Joe's near me, so maybe they are late to the 21st Century in terms of grocery bagging technology/practices?

Also, as a former teenage grocery bagger, I can assure you that tips are just not part of the equation. Not only are they not expected, but in many cases the store's policy will be to encourage baggers to turn them down if they are offered. Where I worked (a prominent national chain), accepting gratuities was a punishable offense.

The local Walmart tried self-check stands for a year but the combination of scales that couldn't be kept working and the undereducated who constantly needed help using them (cancelling out much of the payroll cost savings) ended that experiment.

Walmart cracks me up because their express lanes are for "25 Items or Less".

It should be "…or Fewer", but I'm not even going to get started on that right now.

the aldi they just put up here is smack dab in the absolute worst part of town.

People in a hurry = worst of the savages. You're alive, you have the privilege of shopping in a grocery store with fresh food and all, maybe take a klonopin before you go shop or something

every Aldi I've seen has been in cracktown xp

I admire any chain that gives the worst parts of town an actual grocery store to shop in.

lol i must live in the worst part of town

xps: I miss the hell out of my WalMart. I would have thought given the working-class skew to my neighborhood that there would have been a Wal-Mart less than a 30-minute drive away, but no. There's a K-Mart, which is like a Wal-Mart but the merchandise tends to be seriously substandard. Then there's a Target not far away which is great, but that's not a Wal-Mart either.

The local Walmart tried self-check stands for a year but the combination of scales that couldn't be kept working and the undereducated who constantly needed help using them (cancelling out much of the payroll cost savings) ended that experiment.

Ours still has them but I have the feeling they'll be gone soon. In the defense of the undereducated, they are not very intuitive and are a big hassle if you're buying a lot of fruits or vegetables. Plus, it seems like it would be pretty easy to cheat them.

This is usually my favorite part of shopping at Kroger on Saturday:

EMPLOYEE: Attention, everybody! We have three stations open with no waiting in our self-service aisle!
CUSTOMERS: [continue to stare straight ahead.]

xpost -- oh yeah, I could always make note of the PLU# of a cheaper variety of apples or whatever and take the Bentonville billionaires for a few cents per trip

so you stole from the market

the aldi here is in the projects.

oh wait, I got my verb tense wrong -- I meant to say "I could have made note..."

haha, okay. i just thought it seemed out of character.

::whistles tunelessly, walks to car with apples::

lol

"But that's not in the book!"

Their heads would probably explode.

Parsnips are the most common sort of confusion with me and cashiers in the states.

Yeah - those too! Tbh though I get confused by root vegetables sometimes too. I have had to consult the internet on more than one occasion when I wasn't sure exactly what something that came in the delivery box we used to get was.

parsnips, turnips and some radishes all sort of look alike to me

"Is that a parsnip or are you just happy to see me?"

Do you also pay for your own bags? We have to: five cents per plastic bag.

― Nathalie (stevienixed), Wednesday, March 30, 2011 6:19 AM (3 hours ago) Bookmark

It was a long time ago (I was there for a couple of months in 1994), but I don't remember any disposable bags being present at all. I think I had to buy a reusable tote bag or two.

i like the self-scanners because the cashiers often don't notice that i have obsessively picked the cheapest produce out of the all the different variations. that is not a SWEET ONION that is a YELLOW ONION, there is a FORTY-CENT PER POUND PRICE DIFFERENCE!!!!

This EXACT thing happened to me last week, same onions and price diff! Obviously being English I didn't say anything, just looked a bit grumpy about it when I realised.

Me too, a couple weeks ago. Picked the Jazz apples explicitly because they were 79 cents/lb (and I'd never had them before), got charged for Fujis at $1.79/lb. Not that big a deal with ~2 lbs, but still pissed me off.

it adds up.

i've entered organic apples as regular ol apples on "accident"

The thing that bugs me about Trader Joe's friendly cashiers is that it's so obv a corporate-ordered faux friendliness. I like spontaneous, genuine friendliness, I really do.

I've wondered about this too but whenever I encounter the TJ cashiers out and about in the neighborhood they seem just the same.

it's the implanted microchip

The Manchurian Cashier

"OH HAI EEPHUS! HEY I SEE YOU'RE WEARING LEVIS, HAVE YOU TRIED THE NEW CORDS THEY CAME OUT WITH? THEY'RE REALLY COMFY! OK NICE SEEING YOU, COME AGAIN!"

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_D1ZZyTOG7tQ/SPe79j-_U3I/AAAAAAAAC3E/AxtnFvTrnfE/s400/The_Stepford_Wives_1975_Grocery_Store.JPG

The memorising of prices definitely *was* the case until they introduced scanners into stores.

...and I guess putting price tags on stuff wasn't an option for some reason.

Price tags and guns are expensive. Also, I wonder if having to remember all those prices actually keeps you more alert while you're working the till?

Ok, so I did this today. I took the plunge. And it wasn't so bad! Just another way in which ilx has improved my life, like enjoying the music of Ashley Simpson or making fun of people in cargo shorts.

i don't bag my own groceries, but there's no shame in my game cuz in Publixs in America it's nearly impossible to do that

Did this again yesterday, even though there was a bagger, because it looked like he needed some help. Then when I got home, it turned out that bastard had put my kale on the bottom of a bag of much heavier stuff. I don't think I'm going to let anyone bag my groceries again.

People who let incompetent buffoons bag their groceries are the most irredeemable scoundrels

http://i.imgur.com/iltZs6j.jpg

I support this

Make bagging great again