Supermarkets

 

My late Mothers (in the long white shirt) shopping at Wegmans Downingtown, PA. She LOVED Wegmans!

One big thing that I miss since we moved to Delaware in 2006 was Wegmans super market. 

Have you ever been to a Wegmans? I remember the first time I heard the name Wegmans. I was working as a hotel front desk clerk in Lionville, Pennsylvania way back in 1999. Linda, the hotel salesperson, informed us that we were going to have a LOT of reservations for the new Wegmans. I never heard the name Wegmans. I asked her "What's a Wegmans?" She smiled at me and said "You never heard of Wegmans?" I admitted that I did not. She told me it was a supermarket chain that began in Buffalo New York. Well, this was the first time I had heard of Wegmans. What was the big deal anyway? She advised me to check it out on their grand opening day. Oh sure, I'm going to do that. Crowds and crowds and forever to check out. Oh yes, that was always my experience with supermarkets, old and new. All those check out stations and rarely more than three of four manned by checkout clerks. Didn't matter whether it was Acme, IGA, Clemons, A&P. Same deal, big store, cluttered aisles, slow checkout.

However, after more assurances by Linda, I did go on the grand opening day. As I expected the parking lot was packed. Some difficulty finding a parking space. Found one and went into the supermarket that was crowded with shoppers. This Wegmans was located in a former 84 Lumber store in Exton, PA. "God, I'll be forever getting out of here" I thought. 

I grabbed a shopping cart and began may tour de force. Well, I was immediately impressed. There was a hot and cold food cafeteria style area. Freshly made food at reasonable prices. The produce area was HUGE. Big open spaces which is unusual from my experience in supermarkets. Usually they have the aisles cluttered with displays to entice you to buy items from those displays. An all too typical marketing ploy which was really getting old. Some years ago I read about the top two complaints against supermarkets.

Number #01 - Slow checkout

Number #01 - Cluttered and blocked aisles

There were also other specialty areas. Ready made foods to take home. And that was a large area. More than just rewrapped subs and pitiful looking casseroles that looked like they were made a week ago.

Another nice touch was a large toy train that traversed tracks around a ledge about ten feet up around the store. A nice whimsical touch for the kid in us. Who doesn't like toy trains?

There were many other speciality areas in addition to the regular rows of shelves with canned and box grocery products. But the real test came at checkout.

"Oh, here we go" I thought as I guided my shopping cart to the front of the store, looking for the checkout lane that I estimate would take me the LEAST time to get out of that crush of people. 

First thing I noticed was that ALL of the twenty-four lanes were open. That was something I had never seen in my lifetime, all checkout lanes open. Which one to get into I thought. While I was pondering my decision I noticed a Wegmans jacket employee come over to me, looks at my cart, which only had a few items in it, and advised me "You can go to lane 14" which was way down the other end. I was puzzled by his concern for me. As I maneuvered my cart to lane 14 I noticed other Wegmans employees checking other shoppers carts and advising them what lane to go into. What was this? Oh, I know. CUSTOMER SERVICE! What a novel idea! Instead of the supermarket acting like they're doing you a favor by being there, here was a supermarket actually making my shopping experience easier. I have to admit this surprise brought a smile to my face. 

Then when I got to my checkout I noticed that the checker bagged my items as he checked them. What was this? No pushing the items aside (preferably for me to bag) while scanning the codes. Again, what a novel idea, to make the checkout experience......how do we say......EFFICIENT.  Man oh man. Now I know what Wegmans was all about and why they have the reputation as one of best supermarkets in the country.

My dentist and his wife retired to Delaware a year before we moved here.  I remember her lamenting that she would miss Wegmans. She said "Going to Wegmans is an EXPERIENCE" and indeed it is.

Pat is also a big fan of Wegmans. When I visit Pat in Canada I fly to Buffalo and he comes across the Canadian/American border to pick me up. We always make it a point to EXPERIENCE" Wegmans in Buffalo, Wegmans hometown.

Since moving to Delaware in 2006 along with many other out of staters who move to Delaware mainly to escape the high taxes of the neighboring states of Pennsylvania, New Jersey, New York, and Maryland, several new supermarkets have opened. They are all Wegmans wannabes. Most of them have adopted the more efficient method of bagging the groceries. And the supermarket I frequent most (Food Lion in Milton) also makes a point of using all of their checkout lanes (they only have eight) when the volume of shoppers requires. However, most of the other supermarkets have not caught on to that basic concept of customer service, the main one being Safeway. Safeway has at least fourteen lanes, I never seen more than two open at a time. I quickly found out that Safeway is a union store, which explains their poor customer service. I've shopped there a few times when I was in the area and I always had to wait too long to check out.  One time was especially galling. I had ONE item. There were two lines open. The checkout clerk in the second line was bagging items for the first lane while chatting with the checker (something I hate, supermarket clerks socializing with each other when they should be waiting on the customers). I saw his lane was open so I motioned to him that I only had one item. When he say I was trying to get his attention he frowned and motioned with his forefinger for me to stay in the line I was in while he chatted with his co-worker. 

Damn! That made me hot. I took my ONE item (a pork butt which I should have thrown at him) put it back and left the store. I was still steaming when I went home so I called the store manager and explained what happened. She wasn't interested. She gave me some word salads but she clearing WAS.NOT.INTERESTED. 

I made a vow never to go in that store again. Of course I've been back since (once in a while I'm in that shopping strip mall and try to save myself a trip) but the service is the same. Non existent Union shop. 

Now there is a new store in town. It's called Redner's. It's another Wegmans wanna be. I have to admit. I like this store. It has a wide open space (how long with that last?) when you first go in. They have a hot food section which has keilbasa and sauerkraut which, although expensive at $9.99 a pound, is good. 

This Redner's store is large and I give them profs for being far and above what we have already here in the Rehoboth Beach/Lewes area but it's not Wegmans. 

Who knows, maybe in my lifetime Wegmans will put their footprint here in southern coastal Delaware. 

One thing that will happen if they do, they're put stores like Safeway out of business. That's what Wegmans did in Downingtown, where I used to live. Four of the nearby supermarkets were out of business within the year. And that folks is how customer service work. 

By the way, these days when I'm a full-time caregiver, my main social interaction other than my doctors' appointments are my super market shopping excursions. This is the only time I get to see and interact with people. All my other shopping I do through my Prime Amazon account.  Now talk about customer service, that's Amazon. I don't care how much money Jeff Bezos has, all I know is that his company has made my life much easier. 

Queuing Up

From my local supermarket, where I go at least three times a week. My "social " life

 My good friend Ur-Spo over at Spo Reflections recently posted about the frustration of choosing the right line or lane to queue up. He specifically used his supermarket as an example. His post thus begat an idea for this blog posting.

Who hasn't experienced the frustration of "which line to choose" to stand in whilst waiting to check out at their favorite supermarket.

I'm lucky because I rarely have that problem now. The supermarket I frequent has a policy of never letting lines build up. If they see a backup, the management quickly assigns another employee to open a new line and to actually tell shoppers who are standing in line "I'm open, you can come over here." But, it always wasn't that way and even now there are backups. 

Of course I almost always choose the wrong line. However, there are several things to look for at my supermarket. One is the REALLY SLOW CHECKER. Oh my God! There is one lady is looks like she's in slow motion. SOO SLOW. Here line is almost always the shortest, regular shoppers know NOT TO GET IN HER LINE. You'll get out faster standing behind three full shopping carts of people before you get out of her line. I made that mistake just last week. I saw that short line, not paying attention to who the checker was until I was in the line behind a couple of people with only a few items (it was the Express Line, twelve items or less) and her line WAS NOT MOVING. I looked up and there she was. Oh no!  Well, I was already committed so I stayed in her line, watching her move in slow motion, examining every item she scanned and oh so slowly put in a bag. God lady, could you go any slower? And then when I finally get face to face with her, behind the plastic shield a la COVID safety measures these days, I look at her and I swear she has to be on something. She.is.out.of.it. Why is she even working there? 

Before I shopped at this supermarket and when I used to live in center city Philly, I frequently had to contend with rich Jewish widows who would invariably ask to go ahead of me in line because they "only had a few items." The frustrating part of it was I invariable only had a few items myself. WTF? I was working at the time and my time was valuable too. What were they doing? Collecting their dividend checks. I usually let them go ahead of me but one time I wasn't having it. I only had four items. The blue haired entitled rich widow behind me had three items. I had my back to her (on purpose). That didn't deter her though, she came around to my side and looked at my basket (shopping basket that is, not the OTHER one) and said "Can I go ahead of you? I only have a few items." Well, this obviously has always worked for her before, after all Mrs. Entitled. But like I said I wasn't having it and I responded to her "Actually no. I TOO only have a few items and my time is as valuable as  yours is."  She gave me a shocked look, and out of her too much lipsticked mouth came (and I kid you not) "Well! I NEVER!" Can you believe it?  Then to top everything else off, the checker was pissed off at me because I wouldn't let Mrs. Entitled go ahead of me. I didn't know that checker well but I had been in her line many times before and she was always cordial to me. However, after my shocking behavior, I was on the outs with her. Ironically the store was named "Great Scott!"

Now here are some other frustrating delays I've had by choosing the wrong line:

The little old lady who pays cash, right down to the coins (who uses coins anymore?) that she has to search for through her purse change pocket. By the way, they never have their purse ready, they look at the total of the bill then comes the purse she sets on the country. Then two or three snaps to get into the purse to the change holder. Then open the change holder, stop and check the cash register to see the right amount of change she need which invariably she does have the exact amount and if she does its almost always in pennies, nickels and dimes which she has to pull out one at at time with the lint in her change purse all the while frequently checking the amount of change she needs again by looking at the display on the cash register. 

The woman (always) who pays by check. Of course she doesn't pull her checkbook out until the checker is completely done scanning her items. Then again like before, she checks the amount on the cash register display before she writes out her check, tears it off the perforated part then enters the amount in her checkbook and if I'm really lucky she settles her checkbook at that time while the cashier stamps the back of her check. 

The man or woman (this delay is equal opportunity) who doesn't remember their pin number. They play around with trying to enter the right pin number for their debit card, and almost always end up using another form of payment.

The woman (always) who questions the price (almost always an insignificant amount) of a product that she thought "was on sale." If it was on sale lady the scanner would pick it up. But she's not having it. She insists "it was in the newspaper, here look." And yes, always she is wrong but sometimes management lets her have the "sale" price anyway under the banner of "good customer relations." I suspect the woman is a scammer. Probably did it many time before.

Then there is the minority woman (have to be careful her in today's politically correct world) who is paying by something other than credit card, debit card or cash. I think food stamps or some kind of faux money or ......I don't know what but it sure does look like funny money. These transactions are never smooth because the funny money only pays for certain items, the cigarette and steaks she has to pay for by real money which she doesn't want or can't pay for. I remember years ago when I worked hard at the bank and went to night school three nights a week for four years, shopping at Great Scott in Center City Philly and being oh so careful with what I purchased only to see young healthy students whip out their food stamps for steaks, veal, and all kinds of expensive food that I couldn't afford at that time. But that's another whole subject to be (maybe) addressed later.

Then of course there are the Chatty Cathys. These are the supermarket customers who know the cashier and they catch up on all their local gossip whilst we all wait behind them in line. While flapping their gums at one another they are always totally oblivious to the long line behind them waiting patiently just to get out of the store.

And last but not least, there are the Casaova's. That's the guys who work in the store flirting with the cashiers who eat it up. Again, not being politically correct here but always minorities. Always. 

Now having bitched and complained I have to say my local favorite supermarket is better than most but I have experienced all these experiences at that same local favorite supermarket. And to try and redeem myself of being biased against minorities, I will says that at least eighty percent of the minority cashiers are just as efficient as all the other cashiers, who are mostly white and old. And I mean OLD. I swear to God, there was an old man cashier last week that had to be at least Bill's age (93) if not older. I felt sorry for him. He was new and confused. An younger employee had to come by and wipe off his scanner glass because the old guy couldn't figure out why he couldn't scan items.

By the way, I NEVER delay in a line. I have out my supermarket plastic up and ready to be scanned before the checker can even get his scanner gun out. And then I tell him "Credit!" and he/she presses the right key on the cash register so I can tap my credit card and them I'm out of there. You'll never see me holding up a line except for that one time two weeks ago I forget an item and had to ask the cashier to "Hold the line while I run back there and get that half and half."  Yes, that was me. Guilty as charged. 

Hey, I'm human too.