I can get pushed over the edge really easily in grocery stores, more so than other kinds of shopping. I try to just get what I need and get out as fast as I can.
I usually go in the afternoon, between 2-4 pm, most stores are not terribly crowded at that time of day. Late at night is bad because of the employees being all over the place stocking product, and I don't like to go out at night anymore anyway.
I am very particular about what I buy, but I am also prone to impulse shopping if I linger and look around too much. The stuff I buy on impulse usually ends up pissing me off because it's not satisfying and it's not really what I wanted. So I try to just stick to certain things I know I like.
But if something I want is out of stock, I can't just replace it with a similar item. And I have to get different things at different stores because no one store has everything I like. It is really frustrating.
There are certain stores I can't shop in because there is just something about it that throws me out of joint. Some stores are just built too small to handle the amount of people who shop there. Sometimes it is just poor management causing lots of problems. It can be anything but if it's beyond my frustration tolerance I just can't handle it.
There is Ingles in particular where they are very lax about things and the clerks tend to have a very insolent attitude. And one problem they have is they don't update all their price signs. The company has a policy that if something rings up for the wrong price, you are supposed to get it for free. And it says so on a huge sign that hangs from the ceiling right in front of the self-checkouts. Well, when something rings up wrong, the clerks act like they have never heard of the policy. I have to tell them about it and ask them if they've never seen the huge sign hanging up right in front of them.
I shop at Trader Joe's a lot and on the plus side, it's a small store, so it's quick to get in and out and I don't have to walk the length of a football field just to get a few things. But it can get really crowded. And the clerks try to be really chatty, it's supposed to have this smiley happy friendly kind of vibe, but it just comes across to me as being really phony. They don't actually have great customer service, they go out of stock on things a lot and if I ask when they will get something back in they just kind of shrug and do this "aw shucks" routine.
I always go through self-checkout, whenever possible, but sometimes it is even worse because the clerks who oversee self-checkouts can be really overbearing. Like a few weeks ago in Kroger one of them yanked off my receipt before I could grab it so she could stop me and talk to me about my fuel points. I thought that was really rude. In general I feel like most companies don't understand what real customer service is anymore, or if they do, they sure don't teach their employees. That is what tears me out of the frame about grocery shopping.
As far as other customers go, I just can't stand the way other people leave their carts in the middle of the aisle, typically on a diagonal, and walk away to look at things, as if no one else could possibly want to get around their cart. What. the. f**k.
18 Apr 2014, 7:56 am
