My 'Morrissons Rage' takes several forms, and is experienced on a weekly basis, so I thought I'd get it all out of my system here, now, and be done with it.
(For readers outside the UK, Morrissons is a supermarket)
Firstly, why do they keep hiding stuff??? Not being able to find the vegetarian gravy granules doesn't mean that I will go "Ooh look, they've put butterscotch sauce where the vegetarian gravy granules used to be, and it looks yummy! I'll buy some of that, too, before I spend ten minutes trying to find an assistant to tell me where they've hidden the gravy granules!" No, it means that if it happens ONCE MORE, I shall do my impression of Michael Douglas in McDonalds in 'Falling Down', when they refuse to sell him a McBreakfast Whatever, two minutes after they officially stop serving breakfast.
I can't, however, repeat my much repeated moan about 'up-selling' ("and would you like any stamps or top ups? A family sized tub of lard? A DVD that you'd pay a tenner NOT to watch, for just a fiver?"), because Mozzers doesn't seem to be too bad with this at the moment (unlike Greggs, who offered me a vast amount of doughnuts for a quid when I went in to buy 2 stotties this morning). So I shall concentrate my grumpiness on the OUTSIDE, instead.
People outside supermarkets: Generally speaking, if you see someone walking towards you, pushing something large, cumbersome and heavy, it kinda makes sense to move out of their way, instead of standing there with a gormless expression on your face and waiting for THEM to move out of YOUR way, doesn't it?
......I'm guessing they're relatives of the people who allow their kids to run amok inside the shop..... and the ones who stop for a chat mid-aisle, their trolleys forming a barrier....
Oh yes, inside the shop again - and it's about SELF-SERVICE CHECKOUTS. I don't know supermarket management hasn't cottoned on: queue of 15 people at the one till that's in operation. 5 self-service checkouts, only 3 of which are occupied. Du-uh. I know some people like them, but more don't. Unless the people around where I live are particularly lazy, of course.
And don't get me started on the taxi drivers on the way home, who don't grasp from your polite yet two syllable only answers that you don't feel like chatting. As Humphrey Bogart said to the taxi driver in 'Dark Passage': "I'm paying you for the ride. If you want a friend, get a dog" (or similar!).
Every time I come back from the weekly shop I vow to shop online from now on. Every week when my husband sees me writing my shopping list and getting my 'bags for life' out, he says "I thought you were going to do it online from now on?".
I suppose I've only myself to blame, really....
Ha ha - I quite like the supermarket but I only go when it's quiet. My pet hate though is when the person behind invades my space either breathing down my neck or ramming me up the jacksie with their trolly. And don't even get me started about them putting their shopping on the conveyor belt thingy before I've got mine on so that everything squashes together. I think that should be punishable by death to be honest.
ReplyDeleteThere, you see, we all have our supermarket gripes!!!!! xx
ReplyDeleteI'm not sure what most of the things are that you mentioned in the grocery shopping episode, but it sounds just like shopping on this side of the pond (learning some British wording from a couple of Brit authors I know).
DeleteI always shop while the little plague carriers (a.k.a
children) are in school. Parents who allow there kids to run screaming through the store are routinely banned where I shop. By banned, they aren't allowed to bring the kids with them. I love it!
Thanks for reading anc commenting, KC, just as I was looking up my comments, I thought - darn, should have mentioned people who let their kids run amok....!!!!
DeleteHaha, Terry, great post. I can so relate to the one about trolley rage. I really hate that too! My own pet hate in supermarkets is their insistence on re-stocking the shelves from huge flat bed trolleys at the busiest time of day when everyone's in there shopping. You have to dance around trying to get at what you want while the shelf stackers ignore all your attempts to ask them to move...and then there's the ones who decide that polishing the floor at the self same busy times is also essential....so yes, we all have our gripes...grrr
ReplyDelete.....and people who let their children run around.......
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Deleteha ha - E L LIndley - I do the putting my shopping up before they are finished, if I have been foolish enough to go into Aldi with the baby and not get a trolley and have a trolley's worth of stuff in a basket and my arms are falling off - but I leave plenty of space, honest! Yes, I also hate people literally breathing down my neck.
ReplyDeleteI hate when the assistant with the huge pointer arrow points at the self-service checkout and I have a baby and a trolley full of groceries. Are they serious? My pet hate is when they have something else on the shelf where what you are looking for is meant to be. I mistakenly bought Mozza's own brand beefy drink instead of Bovril for the OH. I think he thought I was trying to make cutbacks at his expense!! great article
Exactly, that was my gripe with the vegetarian gravy granules! I spent ages the other day looking for cheese twists - in the end a (gormless) assistant managed to find them, but that was only after her asking several others who all looked at her blankly. Still, if you pay peanuts....
DeleteMy grouse (Tesco) is with all the money off/extra points coupons they send you - which don't actually work when you get to the till! This is after trailing round the place for hours in an attempt to locate said product...
ReplyDeleteThis means you have to go and stand in another queue at customer services (and there's another thing... what services?) Of course, because I am a true country grump (in wellies no less) I refuse to do this anymore and have the manager called to the till so he can override my vouchers. (unfortunate use of words there, but you get the drift)
I don't know about them because I don't use them, as I have read all the consipiracy theorist stuff about them just being a data mining tool. Aside from the fact that I never get sent any, because I don't 'like' products on Facebook. Oh, just ignore me!!
DeleteHaha, no I don't like them on FB, they get all the info about you from the store loyalty card. Out here in the wilds of Snowdonia we don't have much choice so Tesco it is!
ReplyDeleteGoing slightly off piste as usual: I used to work in Waitrose as a student and we really got fed up with the stupidity of customers as in 'NO I haven't deliberately hidden the bacon'.....'NO I don't know where the pomegranite vinegar is kept (don't even know what it IS)'..and the worst 'We are actually closing the tills, so you need to be in a queue, not wandering round asking me for stuff'. I learned the dishonest art of the caring smile. I still do it now. *smile*
ReplyDeleteOkay, well you write your article on annoying customers, then.....! And actually I find the Morrissons staff to be very helpful in locating stuff, even the most obscure item, though I have yet to test them with pomegranate vinegar. My grrrrr is with the sales experts who reckon that moving stuff around makes you buy products you wouldn't normally have looked at.
ReplyDeleteWell, we have a Mickey Mouse Co-op where all of the above take place. The assistants are mostly youngsters who are bored with their jobs and studiously ignore all but their peers and spend time huddled in corners chatting, while pretending to be stacking shelves from a trolley two aisles down. I'm lucky; I have a husband who,doesn't mind shopping for groceries (as opposed to clothes shopping - that's another story) But even he can have his moments; he went into the Co-op last week and came back completely bemused by this scenario: HIM: 'Do you have any red cabbages?' (I have a lovely recipe for red cabbage with apples/ sultanas and cider vinegar) ASSISTANT: 'Er' (looking wildly around for rescue from this mad man) 'Er, no ... but the green cabbages are over there and the food colouring is in the next aisle.'
ReplyDeleteThat's hilarious!!!!!! If you saw it in a sitcom you'd think it was far-fetched! Love it.
ReplyDeleteIt gets worse. I was in the shiny new Penzance Sainsbury's on Sunday morning, with just two tins of black-eyed peas in my basket, but none of the checkouts were open. There was, however, a long queue for the self service corral. I asked a woman in a Sainsbury's uniform about the apparent lack of proper checkouts, and she told me that they don't open any until eleven o'clock on a Sunday. I left my basket for her to return the tins to the shelves.
ReplyDeleteIf I were vindictive, I'd go in at ten o'clock next Sunday, fill a trolley with a mix of frozen foods and warm things, and leave her the whole bloody lot as a protest.
Francis, I am writing this on the train, as I am coming down to Penzance to do that very thing. I expect you to put me up, but there will be no funny business, and I don't do lezzer fantasies, okay?
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