My addition: when asked for your frequent shopper number (or whatever it’s called), do not pull out your cell phone and start calling friends and family to find out what it is.
I’m hearing this in Howard’s mother’s voice. 
Roddy
You forgot those idiots who block the aisles. I am in the store to find groceries, not to listen to you and your friend have a chat in the aisle. Doubly so in local ShopRite, which has aisles large enough to bowl in and people still stop in the middle.
I have to say, there is nothing that sets my teeth on edge more than a child screaming at the top of it’s lungs while the parent blithely continues along as if oblivious. Would it be out of like to suggest duct-tape?
I like that suggestion about having money with me! I find that haggling, bartering, and using my good looks doesn’t get me very far in paying at the register any more! 
I’m an exemplary shopper and do my best to be quick, thoughtful, and patient. The only bad habit I have is taking a peek at a magazine on the rack, but I make sure I am completely out of the way of anybody, don’t bend any pages, and put it right back into its holder.
As I tell my wife, that’s just stealing. (especially if you don’t read the advertisements)
I once found at the register that my card wasn’t accepted - it turned out to be the result of some overzealous rearrangement of charges by my bank. After it was clear that there was a real problem I elected to just leave everything I was going to purchase (it was already bagged) with the cashier and just walk away without further ado. Was this the correct/optimal behavior?
My local Safeway has this, except there is one part inside of the store, right by the bacon, that apparently is not included in the cart zone. So you’ll be cruising the bacon, and suddenly your cart will just lock up and become immovable. I always used to wonder why that particular spot always contained a bunch of empty, abandoned carts, until it happened to me. So weird.
As for people going into the store and just stopping inside the doors, my son ran into one young “lady” that did this a few weeks ago. After he apologized to her, I explained to him in my best Phaedra Parks voice that “everybody knows” that you don’t just stop after going through doors, and if you do, you will get ran into. Oh boy, she followed me around the store after that, calling me names and flipping me off. Ahem.
I can get behind most of the complaints here, but not this one. I’m a SAHM right now, and I’ve got shit to do too. If I have to go to the store between 11:30 and 1:30, that’s when I’m gonna go. Maybe you should just buy your sandwich in the morning before work, or the night before, or bring your lunch from home if it causes you so much aggravation.
Sometimes I have to take a sentence out of its context. This is one of those times.
My supermarket has two sets of the big automatic sliding doors - one set marked ENTRANCE, and the one near the checkout lanes marked EXIT. Big huge letters above the doors.
Unfortunately, the EXIT door is closest to the pharmacy, the in-store bank, the customer service counter, the ATM, the Lotto ticket machines, etc., Soooo … everybody comes IN the EXIT door, making it difficult for people to get out of the store. Sometimes traffic backs up in the store because several people with carts can’t get out because PEOPLE ARE COMING IN THROUGH THE EXIT DOOR.
It makes perfect sense that there would be a huge space for empty shopping carts just inside the ENTRANCE door, but why is there so many lined up just outside the EXIT door? This just encourages people to walk up the the EXIT door, pull out a shopping cart, into the traffic trying to, you know, EXIT the store, and then push themselves and their empty cart against the flow of traffic into the store. It is amazing how these people get all upset when they have a hard time getting their cart through the door and into the store because of all these silly people trying to get out of the store through the EXIT DOOR. Insanity, I tell you.
Sure, I blame the lazy and stupid who can’t walk thirty feet farther away and come in the ENTRANCE door, but I also have to blame the stupid store managers for laying out their store so carelessly.
You know those stacks of handy carry baskets that the store has for all those people who don’t need a cumbersome shopping cart for their quicky shopping trip? Maybe it would be best to have those stacked up just inside the ENTRANCE door instead of just inside the EXIT door? Why do I have to enter the store and walk all the way over in front of the EXIT in order to pick up a carry basket? Do you see a problem here?
Is there a specific reason why the areas just outside the EXIT door are filled with hanging plants, stacks of water softener salt and mulch bags? You can’t see if any cars are driving past the exit to the parking lot without stepping out INTO traffic. Maybe you could, like, move the Red Box machine or some other wall-hugging items to the area around the EXIT doors instead of all the visually blocking crap that is piled up there now. Just a thought.
State your preference.
If you say “Can I have the coins first?” then I’ll do it. Trying to make people happy is part of my job (arguably, the hardest part).
That applies to a lot of stuff - don’t want every item in a separate bag? Then say “Load 'em up, I don’t mind them heavy”. Don’t want heavy bags? Say so. Brought your own bag? Say so. Prefer to do your own bagging? Say so. Need help carrying stuff out to your car? Say so.
Staff are not mind readers. Give us a hint we’ll usually bend over backward to accommodate you (well, most of us - there are always exceptions) but we have to have at least a hint.
Optimal behavior would be to have more than one method of payment with you, in case of just such an emergency. (e.g. a second credit or debit card, cash, sexual favors…)
I nearly did this recently. I work from home, and walk to lunch most days. I had moved my wallet for some reason so it wasn’t next to my keys when I picked them up to leave. I thought to myself “grab your wallet”.
Fortunately, I’ve taken some of the standard rants on this board to rant and tend to pull my wallet out of my pocket before I order. Slapped my pocket, no wallet, slapped my forehead, walked back home and made a sandwich.
One more addition. I don’t think this has been addressed yet, but I may have missed it.
If you are stocking up for a year’s worth of groceries, in anticipation of the coming Apocalypse, please begin your shopping early enough to get out of the store by the posted closing time. Hey, it’s usually posted right up on the door you entered by.
Don’t stroll around slowly, having entered at 9:58PM(closing at 10:00PM), with a cartload of stuff. Cashiers have to go home too you know.
If closing is at 10:00 pm, that’s when they Release The Hounds, right? I don’t want to be in the store when that happens!
My sister has a rememdy for that, the parent is always oblivious, so she just makes eye contact with the kid and says “hey kid, shut up.” In this low menacing voice. The kid’s eyes get as big as saucers and the brat always goes and clings to his mom. The best part is when you pass them in an aisle later and the kid is just frozen with fear that the bad woman has come back.
The grocery store is an amazing mix of all kinds of people. This, I think, above all else is why so many of us get frustrated. We forget others are not always like us. Smart folks and slow folks, the rich and the poor, the elderly and the young, the honest and the dishonest, the introverts and the extroverts, those that likes things a certain exact way and those that go with the flow, the folks in a hurry and the folks taking their time …all of these shop in the grocery store. Even among those who are used to crowds, this diversity can be disconcerting. If you are at a football game, you can assume that those around you for the most part like football. At a crowded movie, the group is usually composed of those who like the same genre or director or actor.
The grocery store is a crowd of people sharing only one guaranteed similarity. They eat.
We can’t tell by your looks what type of person YOU are. That’s where good communication can really help.
Examples:
“I prefer to have my bags packed as full as possible.”
“Would you mind not packing the bags so heavy?”
“Please separate frozen from refrigerated, as this makes it easier for me to put away my groceries.”
“I like the paper bags placed in plastic bags, please.”
Most people would be amazed at how many different ways customers can and do want their bags packed. Some people think cold items keep better in paper. Some want cold in plastic because of the “sweating” of cold items. Just ask. Don’t be angry with us because we can’t determine from your looks which opinion is yours.
Also, no one likes it when a favorite product is discontinued. Stores discontinue items because THEY DO NOT SELL! This is not figured out by guesswork, but by actual computers using real data. 10% or so of the items in a grocery store are new each year. Therefore, unless there is an expansion, 10% of the items from last year had to go. Someone cared about each and every one of those banished items. Some loved them deeply. It’s OK to lament the passing of a favorite product. I do it myself. But do not be deluded into thinking that “everyone” loves barbacue -flavored chicken beaks just because you love them and therefore the store is inept in its choosing of items to be discontinued.
Another common misconception is that the store is not ordering enough of Honey Wheat Brand X because there is never enough on the shelf and all the other flavors of Brand X are fully stocked. Actually, we order few cases of that flavor because it does not sell as well as the others. We reorder the popular flavors every day. The slow sellers will get ordered much less often, usually when we are down to only one or two on the shelf. This gives the illusion that Honey Wheat is the most popular flavor of Brand X, when it is not at all. The illusion is compounded if indeed you do love Honey Wheat X. We tend to think others are like us. But, believe me, if everyone and their brother was clamoring for more Honey Wheat Brand X, we’d get it in fast. This is about profit, after all.
It’s a little frightening how much I love the thought of doing that some day.
Or wing it at her head - that is some serious asshole behaviour there - it doesn’t matter who it is or what they’re doing, they get treated like a human being. Period.
I don’t like everything left in a mess - I like to tidy things away. I don’t always go straight home after shopping, either.
Oh gosh yes, that’s great. I love the image. 
But being a dude, I don’t think I would be able to get away with it. They would likely lock me up as a pervert.