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

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::

macintosh under your hat

http://www.phlmetropolis.com/2011/02/by-roz-warren-bagging-your.php

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.

This. There's a metal thing that keeps the bag open, the cashier scans it and it goes straight in the bag. What the fuck happens at other places, everything is scanned and put to the side, and then bagged?

xpost

Er, the point about self scan is you can put pretty much *anything* though for the cheapest weight price, not saving a couple of cents on some apples.

Well, I was never that bold -- or, er, I would never have been that bold.

Co-sign to other posts upthread, staff at our grocery store don't like you to bag your own groceries, and a bagger will usually come over and take it off your hands. They have floaters who rotate around for that purpose.

I don't use the self-checkout unless I'm shopping late at night and only have a tub of icecream, or if the lines are crazy and I only have one or 2 items. I don't want to give the supermarket corporation the impression that I would prefer one of those machines over their staff...because I like the kids who work at our grocery store and I don't want them put out of jobs because I'm in a 'hurry'.

Plus self-checkouts are a total trap -- because most of the people going through it are MORANS who try to check whole carts of groceries, have no idea what they're doing and make it 900 times slower than going through the checkout.

people who decry minor quotidian inconveniences on the internet

and much as I love Trader Joe's cheap snack foods, I don't love it enough to go there because the whole experience is about as annoying as shopping can possibly be for me. too crowded, parking lots invariably suck ass, carts are spindly and annoying, too crowded, too crowded and too crowded

too much unhealthy food masquerading as nutritious

people who take meaningless hassles personally

this is why i have just have the help do the shopping for me

oh god i hate the impatient behind-you-in-line key-jangling impatient sighers

i also hate that i used the word impatient twice

if I ever heard someone doing that I'd turn around and call them on their shit

I hate the impatient dick-ahead-of-me who berates the cashier. I never, ever do this sort of thing, but one guy in front of me was so irrationally dickish that I just blurted out, "Knock it off, asshole." He didn't say anything, and the cashier mouthed "Thank you" to me.

Line waiting behavior is an execellent litmus test for pesronality. I once called off a date after the girl got pissed off at the cashier who didn't have her brand of cigarettes.

Pro tip: just avoid the line with the elderly shoppers. They are slower and you know they'll be paying by check.

I don't think you can pay by cheque any more here. It's like we live in different countries or something.

I avoid the self-service stations since they trigger what may be my only social -- I don't want to say panic attack, but it's something like that.

With the checkout lanes, you get into Aisle 1 or Aisle 2 or Aisle 10. If your line is slow, you're stuck. But at the self-service kiosks, you've got these four stations grouped together and no one is really sure who gets to go next. Half of the people are waiting, bank-style, for "the next available station" while some customers are trying to line up at individual stations.

Some stores manage this better than others, but when it's out of hand, I start to lose it.

http://www.freshdirect.com/media/editorial/site_access/images/FDlogo.gif

Trader Joe's is owned by Aldi, FYI.

it was bought by one of the aldi brothers but it is an entirely different operation separate from the aldi north american chain

What the fuck happens at other places, everything is scanned and put to the side, and then bagged?

Yeah, in some places it's exactly like this!!

Anyway, there have def been NYC scandals where stores were having baggers work for little or no wages, and only being paid in tips. Pretty sure it's not legal to do that, but whatever they're getting paid, tipping still isn't unusual here, and management sure as HELL doesn't discourage tipping because there are tip-buckets right there on the counters.

So maybe it's just different in other places. MAYBE. You all are still disgusting irredeemables.

one of the grocery stores i go to has baggers, also has a sign saying, 'please do not tip the baggers'

you know what's awesome is that Boston-area Super Stop & Shops have handheld scanners which you can use if you have a S&S card that allow you to scan and bag your groceries as you go, and then just scan you S&S card at the checkout counter

POOF all your shit pulled up at once, then you pay and GTFO, I kind of refuse to shop anywhere else now

that is so civilized!

they prob body-scan you on the way out tho

probably a nudist supermarket

I don't use the self-checkout unless I'm shopping late at night and only have a tub of icecream,

they keep the self-checkout open late at night? they don't do that where i live, probably due to theft potential