Grocery store vent!

[Pooh Girl 71]

The natives in Gainesville, Florida call them "buggies". One time at the store, an old lady yelled at me for taking her "buggy". I thought the empty cart I'd taken was mine. If it wasn't mine, actually, somebody else had taken mine. I was afraid she thought I'd taken a stroller with her child in it. She so frightened me that I let her have my cart, and went back to the front of the store to get it.

We call them buggies here too.

All I can say is your damned if you do and damned if you don't. There was a car waiting for my spot the other day as I was putting stuff into my trunk. I took the buggy back to the corral and the guy has the nerve to honk at me to hurry up! It's not like I was even being remotely slow.

And there are some stores that have someone specifically to get the buggies. I placed a client at Lowe's and he gets the carts. Surprising to me, it's a really hard job.

 

[katerkat]

That's why I only shop at places that have convinently placed corrals or baggers. Our closest Wal-Mart has maybe two corrals in the whole lot, so I just don't go there. The commissary has baggers that take everything to the car, so I go there. My Safeway doesn't have a lot of morning shoppers, so I can park really close to the front and take the cart back while my baby waits in the car. Or I unload the groceries, take the cart and baby to the store, then go back and buckle in the baby. A couple more minutes in the cold won't hurt him.

 

[azgal81]

I was at Fry's last night and the cart corral was overflowing but you could still stick the carts in each other so they held. So I rounded up three others that were by the car and put them in with mine. It took what 10 seconds. Even if you have kids that's not an excuse to not return your cart you are just lazy. Maybe if you have kids you should try home delivery it's great you order your items on line and they deliver them to your house. That way you don't have to worry about going to the store and denting someone elses car with your cart because you are too lazy to put it away!

 

[laura001]

Uhhh NO... we have to pay a quarter to get a cart at at my local store. You get your quarter back when you return it to the proper place.

There is still a "cart boy", that goes and collects the from the proper place.

Its not fun when so lazy shopper leaves their cart out and you end up with scratches like the OP.

If the grocery store I went to charged for the cart, I simply wouldn't shop there, even if it was my favourite store. We do have a store like that in our city and I stay away from it.

I would tend to think that most cart damage on cars is not from a cart being left by someone but instead by someone trying to squeeze through with their cart or by a younger person that has no regard for the damage he/she might inflict on a vehicle.

I have to say that there have been a few times in my life where I haven't put my cart away, if the snow is too deep in the parking lot to move the darn cart, or teaming down rain storms, although I would never have left it in between the cars, it would have been in the front area of my own vehicle. Guess I am one of the guilty ones then.

 

[Disney Doll]

I tend to return my cart to the fornt o the store, or to the cart corral.

There have been occasions where I have left it in the parking lot, but I have made sure it was secured between the curb things that they put between parking spaces or I have put it up on the grassy medians that they sometimes put in parking lots, so it wouldn't move or blow away.

Soemtimes I think the non-returning of carts is for a good reason (such as not wanting to leave kids in the car) and I am less annoyed by it if there are no cart corrals. At the grocery store where I shop, there are cart corrals about every 20 feet, so it really does border on lazy if you don't put your cart into a corral there.

But, human nature being what it is, there will always be carts strewn about the parking lot!!!

 

[CEDmom]

I have to say that there have been a few times in my life where I haven't put my cart away, if the snow is too deep in the parking lot to move the darn cart, or teaming down rain storms, although I would never have left it in between the cars, it would have been in the front area of my own vehicle. Guess I am one of the guilty ones then.

Don't worry, you're not alone. I'm not perfect either. On occasion I have done things to suit my needs w/o much regard for how it affects others. I won't make excuses for leaving a cart, it's just something I do sometimes.

 

[Marseeya]

My goodness aren't some of us so high and mighty!

If I had a newborn, and couldn't get my mother to babysit, there's no way I'd leave them in the car while I returned the cart. Puh-lease, my baby certainly comes before your car.

Goodeats - Who admits to sometimes leaving carts on the grass or between the curbstops

Your baby is YOUR responsibility -- not everyone else's who somehow manage to take a cart to the corral or back to the front of the store. I agree that your baby comes before my car, but if you damage my car, then you should pay me for the repairs. But I'm willing to bet that 99.9% of you who think it's okay to leave your cart everywhere but where they belong don't pay for the damages you've caused.

How difficult is it to keep the baby IN the cart, then push the baby & the cart over to the corral, then carry the baby yourself back to your car? I did this every single time with both of my kids. It's just a few extra steps and it's the right thing to do.

 

[JELBoggio]

WOW.

Here's my 2 cents worth:

I am not perfect - the majority of the time I do return my cart to the corral no matter how far I parked. Yes, it does annoy me when others don't return them even when they are so close to the corral. I also don't like it when I start to pull into a parking spot only to find a cart in my way, so then I am unable to park there since it's smack dab in the middle of a good spot unless I am willing to get out of my car to move it first.

When shopping with my kids, I make them go with me to return the cart. Of course, I would not leave them in the car alone. There are occassions when I do not return the cart - like if it's thundering and lightning. I will not be pushing a metal object with my kids back to the corral. I know, flames are coming right?! I do always "secure" the cart in some way so that it would not hit someone's car. Usually this can be done by lifting the front wheels onto a grassy curb.

To those who ALWAYS return their cart - that's great. I'm not being sarcastic. When my car was new, I would part in a remote part of the parking lot to minimize the risk. I find that in a parking lot your car is more apt to get "dinged" by careless car door openers and people who park so close to your car that you need a can opener to get into it.

I know that a car is one heck of an expensive purchase, so you want to protect it as much as possible. There will always be the cart returners and there will also be those that don't. Park far far away when practical.

 

[BuckNaked]

If it's that much of a problem for you, why don't you park your vehicle beside the corral (if that's what we're calling it, I've never heard it termed this before)? Then, you wouldn't have to worry about returning it, or your children.

Yep. Or, you could be one of those bad moms, like me. No matter where I park in the grocery store lot, I'm no more than 150 feet from a cart corral. When my kids were little, I would secure them in the van, put the groceries away, then, and get ready to call the mom police on me, *GASP* push the cart back to the corral, leaving the kids in the locked car.

 

[disykat]

I could say I always return the cart, because I always do now and always have at least 95% of the time. However, I would be lying because when I had infants and toddlers there were a few times I didn't. Pouring rain, screaming toddlers, etc. sometimes took priority. Sure, I tried to park near the corral, I tried to shop when it wasn't pouring (haha) and when my kids were cooperative but it didn't always work. You can be assured, however, that I always secured the cart so it wouldn't move.

I have to add that I was lucky, I remember times when I actually had people offer to help me by returning my cart for me. One time in particular I was 9 months pregnant and just about too tired to drive home after I finished putting the groceries in the car and some gal saw me getting ready to take the cart back and came running over and insisted on taking my cart. It really made my day. When I see people with kids that are obviously struggling or it is pouring rain - I try to do the same. I no longer have an excuse to find returning the cart difficult, so I try to help those who do.

 

[winniedapooh]

We had a store by me that had the quarter thing. It was great. I would go shopping and my DH would walk around the parking lot rounding up the carts that people were too lazy to get their quarters back. He usually made about 2.00 a trip.
Killed 2 birds with one stone. Carts got put back and DH was entertained!

This sounds like something my DH would do!

 

[Am_I_There_Yet]

I don't think it's as much as being inconsiderate, as it is being lazy. I always return the cart.

I had a Home Depot cart ram itself on my back bumper, in windy weather one time. It left vertical, orange scratches the length of the basket's end, down my bumper.

I feel your pain.

 

[TheOtherVillainess]

Ugh..I totally agree. HOW hard is it to return the carts to the corrall or to the store?!?!?!?!?! DH has a car he's trying to sell (Anybody in the DFW area want to buy a 2002 scarlet red PT Cruiser?PM me! ) and the hatch door in the back has a huge dent/crack where somebody crashed a cart into it while he was at work one day.

TOV

 

[kayeandjim00]

Not every place has correls to return it to. In those cases, I try to put the cart up on a curb so it doesn't roll. I have a nice scratch on my car from a cart as well.

This post is confusing to me. If there are no corrals to return it to why couldn't you return it to the store? I'm often somewhere like that and I have NEVER left a cart anywhere but the corral or inside the store. This just doesn't make sense to me.

 

[Planogirl]

If you wedge a cart between the curb and the grass along the sides of parking lots, they aren't going anywhere. To me, it depends on the weather. If it's raining, I'm not walking back to the store to return the cart but I'll make sure that it can't move.

In our area, the wind gets fearsome sometimes. I've seen carts roll at great speed out of parking lots into the roads and that's REALLY dangerous.

 

[Mskanga]

Our local walmart has a zoo for parking , their corral is just next to the handicapped/expecting/ people with infants spots . Usually those corrals are overflowing with carts waiting to be brought back into the store and are all over the place in the parking lot. If the corral is close enough I will return the cart to the corral but if I am parked 200 feet away the only thing I do is secure that cart from rolling onto other vehicles. Honestly I try to park where I know my car is not going to get hit ( like next to curves ) and I am a lot more concerned about people opening doors and whacking my car than I am of shopping carts. Call me whatever you want but in this case I think the stores should have cart corrals everywhere , not just in the priviledged areas.

 

[LisaNJ25]

My goodness aren't some of us so high and mighty!

If I had a newborn, and couldn't get my mother to babysit, there's no way I'd leave them in the car while I returned the cart. Puh-lease, my baby certainly comes before your car.

Goodeats - Who admits to sometimes leaving carts on the grass or between the curbstops

Thank you push your cart with your newborn in it to the cart return and than carry your newborn back to you car. No one is saying to leave your children alone.

 

[sha_lyn]

What drives me nuts is when someone does return the cart to the corral but instead of nesting it with the others, to allow the maximum number of carts to be contained, they just shove the cart and it gets turned sideways and you end up with carts spilling out of the corral. DH thinks I'm crazy but I always nest all the carts in the corral when I return mine. Yes, I'm a cronic cart nester!

LOL.... I'm a cart nester too. It drives me nuts to see someone leave their cart just outside the corral, especially when all they had to do is next it into one.

My van had a huge scratch in the side of it from a cart that was parked just outside the corral. Aparently wind, or just the movement around it caused it to roll into my van. It rolled right into the door my DD was about to open, so IMHO a cart that is not securred is a risk to children, including mine. I don't want to hear the excuse that the only way your child is safe is if you don't park your cart where it belongs. There are several options available.

 

[sha_lyn]

When shopping with my kids, I make them go with me to return the cart. Of course, I would not leave them in the car alone. There are occassions when I do not return the cart - like if it's thundering and lightning. I will not be pushing a metal object with my kids back to the corral. I know, flames are coming right?! I do always "secure" the cart in some way so that it would not hit someone's car. Usually this can be done by lifting the front wheels onto a grassy curb

So did you not push the metal cart out of the store and to your car? How is that not dangerous, but taking a few extra seconds to return the cart is?

Yep. Or, you could be one of those bad moms, like me. No matter where I park in the grocery store lot, I'm no more than 150 feet from a cart corral. When my kids were little, I would secure them in the van, put the groceries away, then, and get ready to call the mom police on me, *GASP* push the cart back to the corral, leaving the kids in the locked car.

Well they better call the mom police on me ASAP cause I've been know to do that too. IMHO kids are is more danger of being hit by unscured carts, than they are of anything happening to them in a parked, locked car for 30 seconds.

 

[MetalPrincess]

I hate when people push their carts into or near my car! I always park my car way out in the parking lot to avoid this and the idiots still find my car!
One time a man pulled into a parking spot, got out and took the cart next to his car and pushed it into my car right in front of me. When I confronted him about it, he denied it. I screamed at him until he left the parking lot, without shopping. Boy is he lucky he didn't scratch or ding my car...