All fair points, Steelerphan, but in my opinion the cashier will be quintillions of times better at bagging (that is, putting the right stuff in the right bags and doing so quickly) than I could ever dream of being, if only by dint of experience.
Once upon a time I worked for all of two days as a cashier in a busy supermarket. It was damn tough remembering how to bag everything, and cashiers and baggers have my respect and admiration for that alone. I’ll leave it to them - with one exception. If there’s a ton of stuff to bag, they have no help (i.e., a separate bagger), and there are people waiting behind me, I will bag as best I can, with the reasoning that every bit helps speed things along.
(None of the stores near me bring your stuff to your car. I must admit I haven’t seen this since the seventies.)
The grocery store I frequent (Winn Dixie) for the most part, not only bags your groceries and puts them in the cart but they also will help you out to your car and load them in your trunk while you crank up. On rainy days they will walk with you carrying an umbrella over you to help you out. I LOVE my grocery store and I wouldn’t think of shopping anywhere else.
There is one particular older gentleman that works there and I absolutely cannot imagine working at his age. I am sure it is to supplement his income or something because he can barely hear, his hands shake as he is bagging and he can’t possibly be less than 80 years old. I feel sorry for him.
Normally when he asks me if I need help getting out to the car I politely thank him and tell him that I can manage it today. I especially do this when it is 95 degrees or more in the summer. Hell, I even help him bag my groceries and lift the heavy items for him. It doesn’t bother me in the least.
I have tremendous respect for him but also tremendous pity for him out working when he should be enjoying his retirement years.
What really gets me are his 16 and 17 year old counterparts at the store who will stand by talking to their friends while I bag my own groceries and load them up while trying to watch 2 kids and get out to the car in the rain and never offer me the slightest bit of help. It’s times like that that I wonder about people.
I have also seen the older gentleman out bringing in stray grocery buggies in the parking lot while some of the younger workers are standing out by the coke machines, smoking a cigarette and yacking it up with each other.
I’ll go ahead and weigh in here - in my experience it’s pretty standard for the cashier to bag the groceries and place them in the cart. If I didn’t use a cart, they will either hand the bags to me or set them at the end of the checkstand for me to pick up. Most places employ bagboys as well (sorry, I don’t know what the gender-neutral word is for that). In fact, at one particular Vons store I frequent, not only do they bag the groceries and set them in the cart, but they always ask if I need help getting them to my car.
I generally don’t buy a lot of stuff at once, so I often use a hand-basket when I shop. After many years of starting to unload my basket onto the checkstand, and having the cashier always say, “Oh, you can just set that basket down”, I just started setting the basket down on the checkstand every time. I’ve never had a problem except one surly cashier (who was young and able-bodied, BTW) at a Target store, who said “please take the items out of the basket”. Not that I mind doing that, but for Pete’s sake, are you so feeble that you can’t lift a bottle of shampoo out of a six-inch high plastic basket? You have to pick up the fucking items to scan them anyway.:rolleyes:
In my experience, baggers depend on the time of day and how much you are buying. At the Kroger and Publix I go to, it just depends. Sometimes the cashier bags stuff, but I’m usually happy to bag stuff while they scan, it gets me out faster. Also, quite a few of the baggers seem to be from the One Item, One Bag school.
My “counter Rant” was based on seeing several posters do this in several threads lately. Didn’t mean to take it out on you. It just seems to have become epidemic insofar as “read a few lines and go off on a tangent”.
Around here, unless you are grocery shopping at Super K-Mart, the usual is that in the absence of an actual bagger, the checker will bag and load the groceries. I, too, would be put out should it suddenly be discontinued.
The only problem I have with this process is that no one ever takes notes of the fact that I have a 22-month old child–who was sitting in the cart seat when I came up with my groceries. This means they should not fill up that area of the cart they are placing the bags in because guess what? I have to sit her back in there to get to the car!
Back when I was a teen – back when the default choice between paper and plastic was a paper bag – I worked part-time at a Randall’s supermarket in suburban Houston. I not only bagged and filled the cart, I schlepped the groceries out to the customer’s car and put them in their trunk. And being the charming young fella I was, I usually got a decent tip.
Sackers, unlike the checkers and other lowest-rung employees, made less than minimum wage when I was working because of the possibility of tips. I usually came out ahead of the checkers after tips, and I was not alone.
Now I’m older, and rather than getting the cheery, competent service I provided to others as a young man, I get grumpy service from apathetic sackers (if I’ve got a sacker at all) who, if I’m lucky, won’t put my bread under a gallon of milk. Which only proves to me that there’s nothing like the profit motive to light a fire under people’s asses.
And don’t get me started on that six-mile walk to school up a hill both ways, you young whippersnappers!
You know, I can see astro’s point about the bagging, esp. if it was at a full-service grocery store. And yes, there are such things as full-service grocery stores. The full-service places are generally priced higher, more conveniently located, and toot their horn about their exceptional service. The discount places will usually have signs that say, “Thank you for returning your own cart. It helps us keep our prices low.”
There was another rant in the Pit recently where people said it was ridiculous to complain about lack of baggers. Part of me sees their point because I am young and healthy and able to do it, however the consumer in me bristles over paying extra for a promised service that is not delivered. If you cannot find enough baggers to provide blanket coverage, then pass the savings onto me. Discount $2.00 off my bill each time I have to bag my own groceries.
I do understand that it isn’t necessarily the fault of the grocery store that they cannot offer baggers at all hours. I see the “Help Wanted” signs everywhere. Face it, the jobs that used to be taken up by teenagers are going unfilled now because: a) a lot of parents simply give their kids stuff that used to be earned by the kids via an after-school job (e.g. clothes, even cars); b) between soccer, basketball, the glee club, and a social life that rivals J.Lo’s, kids don’t have the time for after school jobs; and c) a lot of seniors do need a job to supplement their pension.
When it comes down to it, the grocery store that astro shops in may have only had one applicant for the position. And if the decision is a warm body vs. no body, then you end up with little old ladies and insolent teenagers.
I would cheerfully bag my own groceries as they came down the chute from the checker, but I cannot for the life of me operate those plastic-bag dispensers. I see the teenage bagboys blithely pull single bag after single bag off the dispenser, but when I try to do this I either rip a bag to shreds, or create a cascade of plastic bags merrily shooting their way down to the floor.
I’ve learned to take a sharp axe into the store, and as the checker rings up my items, I run my finger speculatively across the blade of the axe, talking to it and calling it by name (“Sweet Baby”, or, sometimes, “Ralph”). My stuff gets bagged pretty quickly. I’ve even had other shoppers stop by to bag my stuff before running out into the parking lot.
That is so funny, the exact same thing happened to me, at Target. I had gotten used to just setting the basket down since the previous 4 or 5 times, the cashier told me to. Then the bitchy Target checker looked at me as if I were the biggest bitch on the planet and said “please take the items out of the basket.”
Yeesh. It appeared as if I committed some sort of severe shopping faux paux.
Needless to say, I always unload handbaskets now, since I do not want to incur the wrath of the Angry Cashier.
Hello to ASTRO form Baltimore,Md.
My Local grocery store has new registers and belts that go from one end to the other and the cashier scans and bags the items and puts them on the mini belt to finish their journey to the end where the cutomer has to put them in the cart.
I used to work there years ago and am glad to see this well needed change. I figure if you can shop and put it in the cart then on the belt, then you can put it in the cart when finished.
Remember that they are there doing the same things over and over again for 8hrs a day and only get a 15 minute break and you are there for just a few minutes.
(Yes i know all about if you cant do the job then get another one, but noone i know can go all day doing that kind over work with out body stress…)
With the caveat that I really don’t mind carrying my own groceries, I find your logic somewhat lacking. By your reasoning, we must build our own buildings to prevent construction workers from suffering repetitive stress injuries. Or carry our own bags to prevent the skycaps and bellhops from getting hurt.
You know, the other day I went to the market and my nose started dripping as I stood directly in front of the cashier.
I waited and waited thinking, “this has GOT be a joke.” She made NO move to wipe my nose for me and pretty soon the snot dripped down OVER my lips and started running down my chin.
WTF??
In the end, it ended up forming an enormous glob on my chin which detached under the weight and landed on my shirt. Because of that fucking bitch I had to change my shirt when I got home.
But I had to wait for husband to get home to unbutton it for me.
Wow, Sat on Cookie, what store do you go to that includes the cost of that service in their groceries? It’s shameful of them to mark up their produce and then not carry through with their service promises.
Bagging isn’t a simple courtesy that the store is performing for you. You’re being charged more money so that they can afford to have someone bagging. They also do it to keep their line moving - this benefits them at least as much as it benefits the customer. This has nothing to do with courtesy.
Yes, BAGGING. I completely agree. (Although most times I bag my own groceries). Assuming a normal quantity of food was purchased, pitting the process of moving them from the counter to the cart is just petty.
