We don't do it anymore but back when we did we always got our groceries delivered not in bags but in cardboard boxes, like from Amazon. It does seem like reusable totes would be a better way to go.
I'm imagining a trade-in/purchase/buy back program. You show up and your grocerys are bagged in reusable bags. You hand over all yours, and then pay if you've used more than you brought. Maybe they buy back your extras, too.
I'm a convert, but the issue with the bags pricks my conscience as well. Especially the insulated bags for refrigerated stuff...
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I'm reading an epic story that Pokey wrote with his friends, and the very first line is "It started with a beginning." That may be one of my favorite openers ever.
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The CSA we don't belong to does it with returnable bushel baskets.
Environmentalists do it with reusable baskets.
Good Eggs takes back their boxes for reuse but stopped doing it for ice packs, which is a big source of waste.
I suppose online groceries are a clear net time savings but I personally find the process quite a bit more aggravating than going to the store and I rely on physically walking the aisles to remember half the stuff I need on any given trip (and a goodly chunk of stuff I don't need but want anyway (Marcona almonds, anybody?)).
Amazon Fresh uses (large, tough) paper bags, which I then use to store my recycling in.
I've been doing hello fresh 2 nights a week. It means that I cook a real meal more often. Other meals I can stretch over 2 days.
The packaging is incredibly wasteful, but the two of us are wasting less food.
I wish that I could buy the smaller sizes of ground sausage and beef that they send, because it's the right amount for 2 people.
I have not tried grocery delivery yet, in part because it sounds so tempting. The girls have been asking to go back to the local produce/healthy-ish groceries delivery that comes in a returnable tub and I guess we could do that as a bridge of sorts. Anything that encourages me to be a more interesting daily cook is probably a good idea.
Grocery delivery would definitely save time, especially since we're in a habit/rut of making it a family project that eats half of a weekend day, rather than just one of us going. I agree with 6; without being in the store I'd both miss things I need and things I don't need.
The flip side, though, is that being in the store with all the "professional"/gig shoppers is a lot more unpleasant. They're in a hurry, for understandable if deplorable reasons, and the way they interact with other shoppers is pretty different from the ordinary shopper-to-shopper interaction.
Ours is technically "curbside pick up" because it's marginally cheaper than delivery. It's really reasonably priced, though - I think a 3% surcharge.
We did Blue Apron for a while and the packaging was just out of control.
They're in a hurry, for understandable if deplorable reasons, and the way they interact with other shoppers is pretty different from the ordinary shopper-to-shopper interaction.
Hmm, ours seem pretty innocuous - college students pushing giant towering wheeling metal carts with many shelves. They're pretty deferential to regular shoppers, though.
I echo 15 here. They're marked out by a vest, otherwise regular shoppers.
Wait, so this isn't the grocery stores themselves doing the delivery, or a third party with dedicated logistics infrastructure? It's just Grubhub/Doordash, but for groceries? That does indeed seem rather late capitalism (or really early capitalism).
17: Both are options at least where I am. Picking up your groceries outside the store from a drive-through or designated parking spot like heebie describes would usually mean shop staff gathered them for you. Delivery is more often through third-party apps and thus gig workers who gather the food and then deliver it.
Huh. Over here it's almost all centralised by either the grocery store chains themselves, or people like Amazon and Ocado, and they all have their own dedicated warehouses. The groceries are never in the actual stores (unless you choose to click and collect), though they may or may not hire gig economy types to deliver them. Not sure I've encountered the outside-grocery-pick-up option, though maybe they just don't do it in city centres for obvious reasons.
Irate mobs of butchers, bakers, and candlestick makers?
17: No, ours is the grocery store itself. It's just that the bulk of their employees are college students.
I had no idea 12.last was a thing. How repulsive.
Online grocery ordering is literally the last convenience I can imagine picking up. AISIMHB, most of my shopping is in the various markets of the Strip District, and the social aspect of that is one of the pleasures of my life. I'd just as soon pay someone to go out for drinks for me.
19: Out in the burbs, Waitrose definitely does it from the store itself, not a warehouse. I prefer it that way, actually - though it does mean you may not have quite as wide a selection.
I like delivery a lot. As someone who cooks a lot but doesn't drive, it makes it a chore I can get done by myself. It also is nice to do things like schedule a delivery for the day you come back from holiday, etc, so you get groceries but don't have to leave.
I'd just as soon pay someone to go out for drinks for me.
I'd consider paying someone to go out for drinks for me.
24 You're on. I'll head out for beers after work, and send you a bill. Draughtworks Soul City ok with you?
22.2: I feel the same way, more or less. I have my weekly food shopping outing with my stepdaughter, which I don't know if it's exactly fun for either of us, but seems important in that she goes out and interacts with the public, and gets to choose foods and gets to feel useful (checking items off the list). And then I walk over to Lucky's (a slightly impoverished person's Whole Foods) and get things a few times a week and that is always a pleasant little walk.
At this point some good Marxist should insert a pithy quote.
25: You're meeting my colleagues there? Be sure to talk to all the ones that need ingratiating. Don't point out if you've heard stories before. Try not to make your laughter too stilted.
22: Huh -- there are various grocery store chains around here offering delivery (or curbside pickup), but I too have never encountered the professional/gig shoppers in the actual store. Delivery is not for me, I don't think; I mean, come on, when my partner picks out produce I've put on a shopping list, he doesn't seem to notice that this or that item is actually not in great condition (a head of garlic with cloves separating and sprouting, say). I doubt I'd trust a 'professional shopper'.
Anyway, the garden here is going like such gangbusters this season that I just need to step outside to gather, oh god, too much yellow squash and cucumbers, barely controllable tomatoes, jalapenos, green/red peppers, green beans, spinach, kale, and, um, a volunteer cantaloupe plant that's turning out to be really prolific, as we learn about how to deal with it. It's a lot of fun, but it takes time, yes.
26: Yeah. I actually enjoy interactions at the grocery store, as I chat with people about (mostly) produce.
Don't point out if you've heard stories before.
I think I just figured out why someone here seems to dislike me.
28 Sure, Tell them Draughtworks, @5:15.
It's not our fault if they don't make it. No refunds for you, though, if your colleagues don't show up.
A surcharge, in fact, since Charley will have to drink for everyone.
19: What they're describing is how Tesco launched its online delivery service back at the end of the 90s. While John Lewis/Ocado was building enormous dedicated warehouses, Tesco sent a van to each store and built the web application they needed. For a long time they dominated the business.
Maybe on topic: Angry Birds 2 is just horrible.
You'll appreciate it more once you see how they close out the trilogy.
To illustrate the dangers of employing someone remotely, I'm actually not going out for beers but am gong to a city council meeting. Nobody tell heebie.
Count me with JRoth and peep, 22 and 26. I spend too much of my time in my home and my office, and anything that takes me out of those two places is a welcome diversion. Plus, I have now often got my wife and daughter accompanying me on shopping excursions, which I like.
And like Yawnoc @7, I often don't know what I want until I see it on a shelf.
Also, I'm a sucker for the clever new foods that they keep coming up with. There are like a zillion flavors of Pringles nowadays. (I haven't actually bought one of them. I just admire them on the shelves.)
I went shopping once and I discovered (through my son) oatmeal cookie sandwiches filled with cream. They're vegan, so than means healthy.
Even once they've come through your son?
I used grocery delivery occasionally when I was in college and grad school, particularly when I didn't have a car, and the services I used then had returnable crates. It looks like my local store now has a program, but it was rated near the bottom by Consumer Reports, and we live less than five minutes from the store anyhow.
47: Have you checked to see if Public will deliver to your new place?