D.O.P.-T.

[weofodthignen]

We went to Walgreen's; which was surprisingly quiet, because every food and drink item in the place is labelled not to be sold. Apparently a glacially slow inventory after a corporate acquisition. Barmy. Then we went to Costco, which was bedlam. Got bananas and jam and the housemate got frozen teriyaki chicken.

Comments

[warriorsavant]

i hate how much i like costco. apparently they are actually a good employer.

[weofodthignen]

I didn't know that. I have concerns about their harvesting of information for the memberships, and about what they do to independent stores. Their offerings in some areas are far from stellar; I can almost see the cost-saving wheels turning. I'd much rather have a Meijer's. Or for that matter a French hypermarché. But ... certainly better than Sam's Club, and a far better deal than Target has become (I remember when Target was more like Woolworth's, but with cuter items. Damn, I miss Woolworth's.)

[arlie]

Costco seems to me to be unique among area grocery stores, in not placing merchandise either too low or too high for it to be convenient to access. The two large grocery chains we patronize sometimes place price information so low I need to sit on the floor to read it. They also place products so high and deep that as a person of roughly average height, I frequently need to ask taller people for help, climb up on shelving or improvised steps made of boxes of cans, or use a gripper intended for seriously mobility impaired people. I've never had to do any of this at Costco.

They also have enough staff that I've never had trouble finding one to ask "where is ..." or "do you have ...". Moreover, in the relatively short time I've been using them, they have never rearranged their stock; I thus can learn where things are, and have that information be useful on later visits. (They do have some specials and seasonal items that change from time to time, but I never discover whole sections moved, or worse, particular items have been recategorized from "ethnic" to "snack" or vice versa. They also don't tend to shelve by brand, rather than by contents - I can expect to find e.g. all the vitamin C together.)

All in all, they are a good decade behind in the process of enshitification of the grocery shopping experience, maybe more. Except for the crowding, both in the parking lot and in the stores; even well chosen times are crowded, and I can't imagine what they are like on e.g. a Sunday afternoon.

Unfortunately they can't be my sole grocery store, because of overly large packages and low variety. As an example, the local one sells absolutely no dried legumes - you can only buy them in tins. And their typical package serves 12; minimum probably serves 6. (Fortunately, they have quite a lot of packages with 6-12 individual servings, which keep long enough for us to consume all of them without unpleasantly boring repetition.)