People who work in grocery stores are underpaid and often times not the most educated people in the world. Try to remain kind in all your dealings with them. It’ll help you both.
One of my first jobs was produce clerk in a supermarket. I’ve smartened up since then.
Later I was a night clerk in a convenience store. The store shamelessly exploited the elderly folks in senior housing across the street. It also attracted some of the dumbest customers o ne can imagine. I’m reminder of the comment that criminals should have to pass a test to be criminals and the the ones who ripped off convenience stores flun ked the test.
We had an attempted robbery of a convenience store here in Indianapolis this last week. The robber reached for his gun and accidently shot himself in the testicle and groin. Ouch!!! He later was arrested at a nearby hospital.
Mr Izz likes to use the self check out to learn Spanish. He’s convinced that if he hit’s the Spanish button rather than having it just tell you how much you’ve saved in English, that somehow that will teach him how to speak Spanish fluently. If anything, he’ll be able to tell someone to check the bottom of their grocery cart before checking out the next time he’s in Barcelona 
You can do that here…with I think my P&C card and my Price Chopper card. It’s loads of fun to go through the line and give them the card for the other store, and assure them that it really will work. It’s even funnier to see their faces when it does 
I bring one cloth bag and if they have a bagger I tell them it MUST all fit in the one bag. They sometimes look at me crazy but they do it. Sometimes they are even amazed it all fits. (It helps that I shop with the little plastic hand-basket rather than the rolling cart – then I’m pretty sure it’ll fit in the one bag, but once in a while it’s really close.)
Plastic is evil. All our food is wrapped in multiple layers of it. There were layers lain on the fields when it was grown, layers wrapped around it before it went to be processed, more layers wrapped around it to send it to market, more layers when you purchased it, more layers when you stored the leftovers, more layers when you threw it away. And it’s all still out there somewhere because it never biodegrades. It’s horrifying when you think of all the plastic. 
I have never been unkind to a grocery-store checker; as far as I can remember I’ve never been unkind to anyone in a service position unless that person has been nasty to me first. My post is more about the policies of the specific grocery store and potentially the training or lack thereof they give to their employees.
Oh, and the store in question is a union shop, I know at least one person who works there and she’s very well paid.
I keep a harmonica in my pocket. One of the places that I’ll play is waiting in line at the grocery store. The cashiers and the bag people treat me very nicely. One of the baggers plays the ocarina.
The greenhouse company I order from is starting to offer plastic pots that are biodegradable. Wasn’t there something about biodegradable plastic being used in the food industry but there turned out to be some problems with it? It sounds like a good idea though.
I actually recently bought some doggie cleanup bags that are biodegradable.
Sorry sbfluter, but I’m not about to use paper bags to clean up after the dog!
It’s actually debatable whether paper or plastic bags are more environmentally unfriendly. Degradablity is only one of the many issues. Definitely cloth bags are best, if you can remember them…the real cloth bags, not the ones made of recycled plastic they sell for 99 cents just about everywhere anymore (which fall apart after a few uses, and CAN’T be put in the recycle bin). String bags are even better…you’d be amazed at what you can fit in a string bag! Remembering them is, unfortunately, the biggest problem.
On a side note, I was shocked when we went to England to find that I was the only member of our group who thought to bring a cloth shopping bag! Aside from the environmental issues, have you ever tried to carry several bottles of wine a mile or more in a standard plastic grocery bag? Ouch! The handles turn to dental floss in less than a block! Everybody got in the habit of sending me for groceries because, between my cloth shopping bag and the small knapsack I use as a carry-on when traveling, I could carry everything from Tesco to the flat without pain! 
I only wish I’d brought a few more, but I figured everybody’d have at least one, since at least two of the guidebooks I read before going recommended them!
Redwolf
Once the groceries are unpacked, we hang our bags on the doorknob. The next time we leave to go someplace (work, etc.), there they are. they then end up in the trunk until we end up shopping again.
Every supermarket I go to the checkout person asks if I want help with the packing. I always refuse though because they just throw stuff in any old bag and use more bags than necessary. It’s easier in the long run if I take the time to put things in bags myself so that all the fridge stuff is in one bag, all cans and bottles in another, bathroom stuff in a 3rd etc.
The cloth bags my wife made are great. The handles are more comfortable and there is no fear of them ripping like paper. She ended up making them because it was impossible to find ones that are grocery bag in shape, sturdy material, and without advertisement (I was going to make them until she realized that she would be seen in public with them).
The baggers in this area tend to pack bags differently if you drive up or if you carry it out yourself. Usually the drive up bags receive 1/3 less groceries. Every chain around here is different though. Lunds and Byerlys are now owned by the same people, but one has drive up service and the other has some one take it out to the car for you. Rainbow and Cub you bag yourself, etc.
Personally, I dislike people bagging my stuff. The commissary in DC had people that worked for tips bagging groceries. Last thing I needed at the time was people pressuring me to give them money for a service I did not ask for. I refuse the service when possible (and when it doesn’t slow things up).
Many of the supermarkets here use developmentally disabled people as baggers and ‘courtesy clerks’ (the people who take your groceries out to your car for you and who retrieve carts from the parking lots). It’s a nice situation, really…they get meaningful work and a source of income, as well as a chance to be out and around friendly people, and we get really friendly, cheerful, smiling service. Win-win. 
I don’t use self-service checkout lines because the markets use those as an excuse to eliminate jobs. It’s hard enough to make it around here on a checker’s salary (even with union benefits) without having to worry about a machine taking over your job. And no machine ever ran out to me in the parking lot because I’d forgotten my keys or my change on the counter, or smiled and asked how my family was doing. I’ll take the human touch any day of the week.
Redwolf
Sigh. Y’all are soooo deprived!
I just returned from another delightful shopping experience at Publix, where stores are clean, well-lit, and associates will happily assist. They ask “Would you like paper or plastic” and have an assortment of sizes to suit. They also pack as requested, whether heavy or light, and offer to carry it to the car for you. No tipping is expected or allowed.
Publix is possibly the only merchant whose store brands are better than name brands. Their bakery goods are superb. Most stores carry full lines of organic products. Everything is unquestioningly guaranteed and prices are better than the competition.
They even offer free antibiotics, should you require them.
Our Mission at Publix is to be the premier quality food retailer in the world.
To that end we commit to be:
Passionately focused on Customer Value,
Intolerant of Waste,
Dedicated to the Dignity, Value and Employment Security of our Associates,
Devoted to the highest standards of stewardship for our Stockholders, and
Involved as Responsible Citizens in our Communities.
I am presently enjoying a slice of this:
That’s like our Nob Hill, or like Harris Teeter when I lived in North Carolina.
Redwolf
I am not familiar with Nob Hill, but Publix is roughly half again as good as a Harris Teeter, and beats the pants off Gt and Sw*y.
You know, I thought the Sunday Hi and Lois from a couple weeks
ago was insane, but apparantly it’s a real problem…
If I didn’t have plastic grocery bags, how would I get the cat feces
from the litter box to the trash can?
I used to have to clean up the dog do. I used a large spoon. And tossed it over the fence into the open space behind our yard. 