Melanie Rants: Grocery Stores

No matter if I’m getting one thing at the grocery store, or 50 things, it always takes me half an hour. I generally go to the grocery store once a week. So it’s an important part of my life. Obviously. (Did you see my Mindy gif?)

The thing that drives me crazy is the customer service. I normally grocery shop at the Giant (a Kroger store) about 5 minutes from my house. I like to check out with an actual person because I think for regular groceries, it’s a lot quicker than having all the blinking lights and calling over the attendant to check my coupon or confirm that I put my item on the conveyor belt and not in my pocket. 

And every time I check out, the clerk asks me, “Did you find everything okay?”

NO! I did not find everything okay. Have you seen this grocery store? It’s not organized well. Why is there an aisle for international food, but the spices for burritos is in the spice aisle? If I’m trying to buy gnocci, I have no idea where to look. It’s not with the pasta. It’s not in the international aisle. It’s at the end of the produce section (or nowhere to be found). Can you explain that to me?

So when I say, “Actually, I was looking for a marinade rub and couldn’t find it.”

The clerk responds, “Did you look in aisle 12 with the spices?”

“Why yes, yes I did look there. I didn't see any.”

“Um, okay. Let me call over a store manager.” She hits the blinking light.

Now, I’m holding up the line and I can feel the eye rolls from the 3 other people behind me in line. All of my food is scanned and now we’re all just staring at each other waiting. Waiting. (It's tense) Waiting for the manager to come by and tell me that he’ll check the back of the store for the marinade rub.

So I pay and go wait for him in the aisle that the marinade rub should be in. 10 minutes later he comes out and says, “Well, I know we order that item, but we seem to be out of it. I’ll make sure to put it on my list. In the meantime, you could use some limes and oregano (and whatever he really said to create my own marinade rub.)"

Do I look like someone who knows how to cook without prepackaged goodness prepared for me?

No. The answer is no, I don’t.

So don’t ask me if I’ve found everything okay. You really don’t want to know because at the point that I’m checking out, there is nothing that you can do for me when I’ve inevitably not been able to find everything okay since your grocery store is just food chaos that lacks intuitive organization.