Community Chat

[SaggingGal]

After receiving a few too many items near or past expiration and some oddly disconcerting substitutions when using the grocery pickup services I returned to shopping inside of the grocery stores. Whoa in just 3 visits within the past 6 weeks, I was coughed on by an unmasked customer who had an actual coughing fit starting in the produce dept. and continuing all the way into the meat dept. and who was then removed by management per my complaint, from the store; I must have been invisible as I was reached around by a customer with an incredibly long arm for a jar of pasta sauce sitting on the shelf at waist height; thanked by a tall jovial senior as he wheeled past me in the bakery area telling shoppers how glad he was he did not need to wear a mask since, haha, everyone else was wearing one; and bumped into by a drunk senior, smelled from two aisles away, with a full cart of soda pop who then forced me to move out of his way at checkout so he could bag his items immediately on the other side of our shared double belted conveyor, and who then took some of my bags as I bagged my enormous order realizing after a minute they were not actually his.

The concept of early Senior Shopping Hour idealistically offers a safe time to shop for a vulnerable population but in actual execution can be a fiasco. 6 or 7 a.m. can just be too darn early. No wipes at the front door for carts, or disposable gloves sit out in an yet to be opened Covid 19 covered box, no one at Customer Service, no cashiers on the floor, no one to get help from up front, no one to bag items, no one to monitor social distancing throughout the store from the entrance doors to the exit.

Here's a thought regarding less frightening shopping experiences: split up hours of the day AND/OR the different cashier lines into:

Masked and Gloved with Social Distancing

Unmasked and Ungloved and not into Social Distancing

Drunk and Idiotic it has been a long long Spring cooped up inside

YoungandFree bet you wanna be me

None of the Above

[stuyvesant]

@SaggingGal This sounds hellish!  I'm sorry I'm laughing though, the cheerful guy with no mask happy every one else was wearing them.

I shudder to think of the psychic energy thrown his way...

[4kitties]

Oh my!  I sure hope you can use another store the next time you need to shop.  

I always take my own wipes and hand sanitizer with me.  My stores no longer provide these items.  

[queendiva]

On the rare occasions when I have to go to the big supermarket, I go during the last hour that it's open: 7-8 PM. If they don't have everything I'm OK with that. Distancing and knuckleheads not a problem. No lines, either. DS goes there every other week and picks up the few perishables that I need.

I go to Aldi during senior opening every Thursday morning. No lines, well stocked, quick in & out as it's a smaller store.

[suzykee]

OH NO!!! I hope you dodged the "Rona" as we have started to call it. Your experience is exactly why I CAN'T go in a store. I have stage 4 cancer & it would be a death trap for me. I shop Kroger & do the pick up. I always put in the note area that I want the freshest possible or the furthest expiration date & whether or not I want a substitution made. So far so good with the exception of a bag of carrots & I forgot to add the note so the carrots I got weren't very good. The people who bring it to the car have been great. I feel for them 'cause I'm sure they get an earfull from some people when they are out of a product. It isn't their fault. For me it is truly a lifesaver.

[tototwo]

I did the Kroger pick-up for weeks.  Then, I got tired of not getting what I ordered and weird substitutions, so I suited up in my gloves and big mask and went inside the store to get my own groceries.  I was shocked that very few Kroger employees were wearing masks or gloves.  Especially the employees who were pushing around the carts to fill the pick-up orders -- absolutely none of them were wearing gloves or masks, so how safe are the groceries I get in in pick-up?????

Except for a smallish plexiglass wall in front of the cashier, I didn't see any "safety features" as they had advertised.  Other customers were not social distancing, wearing masks, etc.  I did not feel safe.  I hate to be so darned paranoid about grocery shopping!

[AngelPuppy1]

@SaggingGal 

Oh, my --- sounds horrible!  

I stopped going to one food store a good while back because no one was behaving.  I have been getting home food delivery services from them and as time has gone on, the service has been steadily getting worse!  Another place I need to go to occasionally seems to have gotten somewhat better.  I don't know what the answer is --- it seems it's hit and miss and no matter where you go or what you do, there are always people and situations that are not the greatest!  

[FlowerBear]

what a terrible experience! 

[Amelia98]

I just got email from a store I frequent.  It said they're re-opening, but all employees and customers must wear masks; they emphasized No exceptions, not 

open for debate, period.  If customer is not wearing mask, they will be refused entry.  More stores need to have these policies to prevent asymptomatic spreaders from passing virus to others.  I will only patronize (now and in future) stores that exhibit good public health policies.

[happycat]

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@Amelia98 wrote:

I just got email from a store I frequent.  It said they're re-opening, but all employees and customers must wear masks; they emphasized No exceptions, not 

open for debate, period.  If customer is not wearing mask, they will be refused entry.  More stores need to have these policies to prevent asymptomatic spreaders from passing virus to others.  I will only patronize (now and in future) stores that exhibit good public health policies.

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None of the stores here are doing that, and I wish they would.