The lowly shopping cart - and other stuff

Ah - that explains something ... I've noticed some strange activity round the aisles in Sainsburys recently - people wandering around with little guns, bleeping. Only a small number of them - perhaps the system's new at our local store? I'd presumed they were doing some sort of stock check

I use them all the time. Some of our cashiers have a nasty habit of licking their fingers to get traction on the plastic bags. Not exactly hygienic.

I only use that at IKEA, because only there's a time advantage.

Warning: Do NOT turn your back on your Cart!.....

There is an enormous IKEA store in Southampton, and people have travelled hundreds of miles to go there. I've never been, the fact that you have to follow a route all around the store, and can't just pop in and out, puts me off. I get claustrophobic just thinking about it.

CJ have you read what I wrote? We do have it here in the US - see my links - and the bonus you do not even give to a cashier you go to the same self checkouts and scan your gun then your card and pay at the machine - in cash, credit or debit (or gift card).

In my rush to checkout - I once hit spanish - imagine following the instructions in another language...I had french in school not spanish - I managed.

When my daughter was a toddler and she was sitting in the cart, I had my back turned looking at some produce -- I was close enough to reach her/the cart, but had my back turned.

Imagine my horror when some lady pushed the cart with my daughter inside so she could get to whatever she was trying to get at. My daughter was terrified. I yelled at the old bag and told her never ever to touch a cart with a child in it. And then told her -- all she simply had to do was to ask me to move the cart.

I think I scared the crap outta her -- imagine engaged out of control protective mom with the desire to smack the idiot in the head.

Yeah that was how I felt -- my daughter was saying I was really scared.

Yeah I understand the death grip.

While I do leave my cart at the end caps and foray down into the trenches of the aise to capture my Bertolli pasta, it's less than a minute or 2 to go down one aisle and back up the next. I doubt anyone would think the cart abandoned for that amount of time.

Ice cream decisions of course disqualify the above of course. That goes unsaid.

I was more talking about the people who have to remain in physical contact with their cart every moment. Like you'll see them taking 2 or even 3 steps away, but their entire body is now contorted because their hand cannot be released, no matter what.

I've put an item accidently into someone elses cart, and watched others do that to me. That can happened even if you're just a foot away. Hey, it happens.

Yeah, I thought about the fact you've already scanned your item. I guess you'd have to check before checking out everything was all right.

You know what? I do see a problem with having those bags hanging from hooks, so your products are out of sight. It would be impossible to tell one cart from the next.

The carts themselves would have to be clearly labled so you know which one was yours.

There's a locally owned nursery here that I sometimes go to. They have those low plat style carts for loading plants on.

They all have names painted on the front like:

Sir Paul McCARTney
Stop Dragging my CART Around
Total Eclips of the CART
Dolly CARTon

and so forth

I always look for and try to get The CART of Death.

Of course you do. I would think nothing less of you.



I have my own bags I bring - they are an array of various bags -- I like Trader Joes re-useable bags -- they had a Boston one that I bought a couple of -- I have one from the orthodontist and one from Metlife so I don't get confused which are my bags when I self-scan.

oh yeah, geez, I forgot about your own bags.

Yeah, here in Austin throwaway plastic bags have been banned, so everyone brings their own cloth or durable plastic bags to the store.

I guess you'd recognize your cart by the bags you have.

I still think the carts should be named though. Like Zelda, Maurice or Heisenberg.

I would definately want to get the Heisenberg cart.

I might like the new personal scanning as you shop thing, looking at it, hearing about it here for the first time, and do see it as the future.

I see Andrew's point, and my own point, that the checkers and baggers in my store are part of my immediate community and I've gotten to know them moderately well over the years; aside from the trauma to them of losing their longtime jobs, I would miss them a lot myself. The other thing is, people moving along with grocery carts and scanner 'guns' seems to me like a failed utopia scenario for a video.

I can see how it might look like a failed utopia, but in reality it's a scan gun that is positioned in a holster on the steering bar of the trolley/cart.
Shopping is done as normal, but the item gets a quick beep on its way to the bag.
At a glance I can see how much has been spent in total and how much each item is being charged at.
At the checkout part of the shop, queuing is kept to the minimum (I hate queuing - a total waste of my life) and the shopping doesn't need unpacking, purely to re-pack it again.
Pay the lady, bugger off and walk past all the other ordinary checkouts, trying not to feel too smug.

The other big thing is that the shopping gets packed with no pressure, and correctly. Gone are the days when stuff is flying down the belt at me to be quickly chucked into any old bag in order to not hold up the grumpy queue behind me.