Shopping cart etiquette

What is with people's inability to to drive shopping carts?!

The consistently worst drivers are around the free-food kiosks at Costco. The next time a woman (it's always a woman) leaves her cart in the middle of the walkway to get a cheese sample, I'm of the mind to push her cart all the way to the other side of the store before she notices. Ugh! You want to stop? Pull over first. Would you stop your car on the freeway? Probably... At least guys seem shamed into driving their carts fairly well, but women seem totally clueless.

Good thing there's no HR department here...

Go ahead, nudge that cart down the isle, it'll feel good. Then turn around and watch the search commece...I've dont it, it's fun. Just don't be too obvious watching for her reaction....

What I will go bonkers about is in check out, and they bump you with their cart--I don't care if your kid did it, or you "leaned forward". Ny ankles and or back do not enjoy the nudge, and I DO let them know.

Just run into their cart with yours.

Always works for me.

Shawn

I've been in TN for a year now and before that FL. The FL residents are 5 times worse about this than the TN residents. For what ever reason, the TN residents are much more aware that they aren't the only person in the universe. I used to come home fuming because of this and my wife could never understand why it pissed me off so bad. I frequently just got hold of their carts and moved them out of the way.

My wife is guilty of doing this. She gets pissed when I mention it to her, too. We don't go shopping together unless I'm pushing the cart. So many people simply lack spacial awareness.

There's a Costco in northern VA that does a million dollars a day. Crazy busy every weekend. it's not only the free food areas, but dang near every intersection is lawless.

racinginc215 wrote: I ALWAYS either take something out of said cart or put something in. I love it when Old women have 5 boxes of condoms in the cart at the check out.

That's pretty funny, and a good idea.

While I said it's tempting to push their cart all the way to the far corner of store, I'm not sure it would really solve anything. That is, after it happens once or twice, instead of getting a clue, they're likely to just keep hold of it when they push in to get that yogurt sample, making things even worse. Still, pushing the cart off would make me feel good, so that's got to count for something...

i've noticed the same type of thing... just an absolute refusal to play any attention to their surroundings... makes shopping fun...

My local grocery just recently bought smaller more menuverable carts as an option for the light shopper. I call them "Racer Carts" think the miata of shopping carts as they allow me to turn for, stop for and aviod all the other shopping morons I deal with. It has made for a much more entertaining shopping experience for me. I won't even get into the rediculous lack of consideration I see everytime I go shopping.

it has been my experience that the people that leave their cart in the middle of the aisle tend to be larger people..

I just move them out of the way...but make A LOT of noise as I do it. The offenders always look at me like "gee, I'm sorry, I didn't realize there might be someone else in the store".

Along the same lines as folks stopping in the middle of the aisle, are the folks who do move their cart to one side of the aisle...so they can block the aisle with their bodies as they check out stuff on the shelves.

I nearly lost it a week ago when a lady blocked several doors on the frozen food freezer by stopping her cart next to the freezer and then answering her cell phone. I figured life is too short and just walked away.

LopRacer wrote: My local grocery just recently bought smaller more menuverable carts as an option for the light shopper. I call them "Racer Carts" think the miata of shopping carts as they allow me to turn for, stop for and aviod all the other shopping morons I deal with. It has made for a much more entertaining shopping experience for me. I won't even get into the rediculous lack of consideration I see everytime I go shopping.

winn dixie here has those... they are about 1/3 the length of a standard cart and have an upper and lower basket... i love those things... better then a basket and much quicker to move around then the big uns...

one thing I did find odd in europe the karts are much smaller and all 4 wheels have casters on em instead of the front wheels with casters and rear fixed like in the US....

I've said it before--here on these boards, too--if you want to know what kind of a driver someone is/will be just watch them push a shopping cart through the market.

It's by no means limited to women, either. Men do it just as much. I just nose them out of the way with my cart and if they say anything, I ask them if the park their real cars like that, too.

Jealous of y'all. 99% of my time in Costco is on the clock, and I cause enough trouble while I'm stocking or running a register, can't get away with messing with members carts.

That being said, by all means, I love seeing members mess with each other!

(As for who is worst, I'm at the closest US warehouse to Vancouver... yeah.)

racinginc215 wrote: I ALWAYS either take something out of said cart or put something in. I love it when Old women have 5 boxes of condoms in the cart at the check out.

Thanks for the idea

Go to a higher class grocery store. I seldom have to root the seniors at my local Safeway out of the way, but Superstore or Costco seems to be full of white trash with howling kids and tramp stamps hanging all over the place.

vwcorvette wrote: I've said it before--here on these boards, too--if you want to know what kind of a driver someone is/will be just watch them push a shopping cart through the market.

So many people early apex the turns and end up washing wide into oncoming traffic.

I make sure to check my blind spots before merging onto different aisles.

Graefin10 wrote: I've been in TN for a year now and before that FL. The FL residents are 5 times worse about this than the TN residents. For what ever reason, the TN residents are much more aware that they aren't the only person in the universe. I used to come home fuming because of this and my wife could never understand why it pissed me off so bad. I frequently just got hold of their carts and moved them out of the way.

That's cause most everybody in Florida is from up north.

My problem with the higher scale grocery store vs. say Wal-mart here is that the snooty rich crowd can be a pain. We have a higher class store, and it's filled with people who all think they are the only ones on the entire planet that exist. The parking lot is filled with chrome laced tanks and everyone in the store is usually on their phone, standing around, and giving other people dirty looks. At the other stores it's the exact opposite problem. Trashy people with five million kids everywhere. That's why I go to a store that almost no one goes to any more. They will probably go out of business one day, but I'll enjoy shopping in peace while it lasts.

The narcissistic rich asses where I live drive me nuts. It used to be a nice town. 25-30K good normal people. Then the Mercedes/BMW/SUV crowd found it. Now there are 80K stuck up shiny happy people living here. The house is for sale and I'll be gone shortly. I'm moving to where the normal people live.

Be honest.. Who makes noises and sometimes ocasionally will drift shopping carts around the store? I do.. I have a disease.

I call the people the OP mentioned 'obliviots'. OBLIVIous idiOTS'. Since they tend to be E36 M3heads and I'm trying to raise my kid to not be a horse's butt like they are I just squeak on through. Of course, years of fitting 32" wide handlebars between trees 35" apart at 35-40 MPH gives me a pretty good eye for it... and yes I do drift my carts.

EDIT: Damned if I didn't get 'canoe' ed.

Oh yeah, my carts get drifted. They also get heavy things placed towards the front to make the rear lighter for the lulz.