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I never return my carts. I used to bag groceries in a grocery store and whenever I got sick of customers and/or coworkers I'd go get the carts. The more carts f
by helterskelter 11mo ago
I never return my carts. I used to bag groceries in a grocery store and whenever I got sick of customers and/or coworkers I'd go get the carts. The more carts far out in the parking lot the better, I could an entire shift without being inside talking to customers.
- theoldgreybeard 11mo agoMy dad never returns carts. He also worked at a grocery store when he was young and had the same mentality as this. He also said that he is "creating work" for these young kids and it's good for them ha. Personally, I return carts - because when I worked in a service job, I always had more "important" things to do than clean up after slob customers.
- johnnyanmac 11mo agoJustifying laziness as a mean to maximize menial work really shows the little ways society has slipped off.
- theoldgreybeard 11mo agoKnowing my father, laziness has absolutely nothing to do with it.
- al_borland 11mo agoI liked getting carts too, but I return mine, because no one else I worked with liked doing it. I’m not going to force someone to do work they might not want to do. I don’t know them, and statistically (from my n of probably 50), most people don’t want to do it… especially in the winter. Most of the time I will leave my cart inside and carry my bags to the car. I use the small carts and they run out a lot, so I like to leave it there for other people who like the small carts.
- deleted 11mo ago[deleted]
- russdill 11mo agoI return carts, but I too worked at a grocery store and so did a fair amount of cart wrangling, a lot of it during the Phoenix summer. It was very zen, watching the monsoons build. Certainly didn't mind it. Stores in the US provide a lot of services to shoppers; bagging groceries, taking them out to your car for you, etc. I don't see why collecting your cart can't be part of that. The exception here is stores like dollar tree, where employees are treated like absolute trash by corporate.
- johnnyanmac 11mo ago>I don't see why collecting your cart can't be part of that. The tech equivalent of this is "registers and RAM are so fast, why can't the Har drive just be all RAM?" Baging groceries is centralized in a specific spot. Taking groceries out is a rare task you can expend a few employees for. Having people dedicated to collecting every single cart in real time is expensive. At that point it's easier to designate a garbage collection time and make laps around the property .
- russdill 11mo agoYou have to be out there getting them from the corral anyway. There's no people dedicated to collecting carts, it's just a periodic task. Know what's super annoying and time consuming? Facing product. Yet no one gives people shit because they don't face product after they take it and expect employees to do it. The cart thing is just mental gymnastics to make people feel like they have self worth and are better than others. Ya single young dude, you're so much better than the mom with the bum knee and two kids that put her cart off to the side rather than taking it to the corral. There's a million such services provided for you when you shop at a grocery store, wrangling carts is an extremely minor one.
- bombcar 11mo agoI’m sure if we did a study of cart non-returners the vast majority would be moms with bum knees.
- johnnyanmac 11mo ago
- russellbeattie 11mo agoI'm now completely torn! I always return carts just out of habit as a nice thing to do, but I totally see this as a legitimate reason not to return them! I never worked at a grocery, but I have worked at other jobs where there was that one task that got you out of sight of management so you could take your time and mentally relax for a while. Taking the trash to the dumpster way out back, restocking the walk-in fridge from the basement, etc. It was less about not working, as it was about the freedom. Then again, they still have to go out to the cart return areas to collect them which takes time, so in that sense leaving carts around just makes their job a bit harder. Hmm. Not sure now!
- bombcar 11mo agoLeave the carts wherever you will and pull the fire alarm as you leave; free break for everyone! I assume the issue is apparent.
- cush 11mo agoOkay but stray carts block parking spaces, reduce accessibility, and damage cars when they roll around.
- stronglikedan 11mo agonow you're moving the goalpost. the vast majority of folks that don't return them leave them out of the way
- cush 11mo ago> now you're moving the goalpost What a strange accusation when the second sentence in the article is... > One cart was wedged into a curb, another sat toppled over in a parking spot, a third drifted like a metal tumbleweed across the lot The reason people put carts away is to avoid the obvious issues caused by not putting carts away...
- CommieBobDole 11mo agoI question this assertion. What 'out of the way' exists in the parking lots you frequent? Every one that I can think of offhand consists of parking spaces, areas for people to walk from their cars, driving lanes and little else. Anywhere you could leave it other than the designated place is causing a problem for someone.
- slumberlust 11mo agoTell that to the dent in my door.
- bitwize 11mo agoYou're onto something. It's an almost perfect autistic/introvert "slap on some headphones and do something to feel productive without having to engage with humans" task. But most people hate it, so my wife and I try to show consideration.
- kgwxd 11mo agoThese days, there's like 1 kid working an entire grocery store, I don't think they'd love coming back in to an angry crowd of waiting customers.