I didn’t borrow it, it was provided to me as a service for consideration. The consideration is the not-insignificant markup on all the food I bought from them.
The practical reality is you will never get 100% participation in cart returning and the store will therefore always need people to run the parking lot. They know this, I know this, everybody knows this. Since this is the reality, you pay for the employee to return your carts whether you politely return them or not. Or did you imagine that the grocery store provides carts for everyone out of their deep-seated sense of altruism?
Grumbling this to myself for the thousandth time in a Costco parking lot, I looked out at the sea of parked cars and realized that the majority of people probably DO put their carts away responsibly, otherwise the dozen carts I saw askew would’ve been a hundred-fold.
There is a bit of German internet lore here. Shopping carts are called Gittertiere (grille animals). And there’s also a community Gittertiere on feddit.de where we post grille animals in the wild, living their natural lives (abandoned shopping carts).
This grille animal was “stuffed”, more accurately translated to taxidermied, which I expressed my sadness about.
I used to work bringing in carts at a store and it was the best part of my job. I see this as just a cost of doing business for these giant stores that need carts to begin with, although I always put my cart back. I can understand if the thing is way far away though. Who cares? Let them pay someone a fair wage to keep track of them. We know that will never happen though so you need to bring it back to be considerate to other shoppers. Giving the store free labor lol
Thanks for saying this. Folks that get enraged at the cart thing have something else going on emotionally they need to deal with. Like, the world is out of their control and it’s going to shit so their mind goes to exerting any sort of control it possibly can in order to compensate for their general powerlessness. What we need to do is think hard how to affect what change we can and do that and learn to let go of stuff outside our influence.
Same! I loved just putting on headphones and walking around the parking lot collecting carts.
I don’t put the carts back because it was fun for me and I am giving that me an additional 2 minutes out of the building to just not listen to a Karen complaining at checkout.
Hypothetical: do you leave your triplet infants in the unsupervised car to return the cart a minute away as to not be deemed an animal by people that didnt see your kids, or do you return the cart then try to carry three infats back and put them in the car? Not everything is black and white.
I agree with this. Safe spot is nearest pothole/planter not in the way of other cars. The whole idea that if you don’t return them to the corral makes you subhuman, my horse ain’t that high folks.
Parenting can be pretty fucking hard and people should be more gracious or at least understanding with parents for it. Not justifying asshole behavior but just know that they may not be as able to be their best self in that moment.
I’m curious? Do you also do this at Costco? The one I usually go only has two corrals and they are on the extreme sides of the parking lot, everybody leaves the carts between parking spaces. Abby other store I definitely put the cart in it’s place
When I worked at a store we had two sizes of shipping cart and they couldn’t interlock but people would force it anyway or back them in to engage the coin latch. The cart sheds became a total mess and the store was too understaffed and the manager often ended up doing the cars, badly, in favor of pulling people off indoors cleaning or w.e. I often left the cart over a parking separator brick so it can’t roll into cars, but doesn’t add to the jumbled mess in the shed.
The shopping cart is the ultimate litmus test for whether a person is capable of self-governing. To return the shopping cart is an easy, convenient task and one which we all recognize as the correct, appropriate thing to do. To return the shopping cart is objectively right. There are no situations other than dire emergencies in which a person is not able to return their cart. Simultaneously, it is not illegal to abandon your shopping cart. Therefore the shopping cart presents itself as the apex example of whether a person will do what is right without being forced to do it. No one will punish you for not returning the shopping cart, no one will fine you or kill you for not returning the shopping cart, you gain nothing by returning the shopping cart. You must return the shopping cart out of the goodness of your own heart. You must return the shopping cart because it is the right thing to do. Because it is correct.
A person who is unable to do this is no better than an animal, an absolute savage who can only be made to do what is right by threatening them with a law and the force that stands behind it. The Shopping Cart is what determines whether a person is a good or bad member of society.
Aldi’s deal is more about getting people to return carts all the way to the front entrance so that they don’t have to pay employees to retrieve them from the corrals.
Of course, with their parking lots being small to begin with, I’m not so sure it’d make much of a difference (see also: Lidl, with the same size parking lot but no 25¢ locking carts).
If your cart catches a breeze and dents my car then you’re now providing profit to a body shop. Putting your cart away is about not costing random people hundreds of dollars. And it saves the teen making minimum wage from chasing it down in the snow.
Fuck the grocery store, of course. But if you want to screw them over then there are better ways to do it, and with less collateral damage.
Your misguided attempt at rebellion against capitalism in reality only hurts the grunt that has to pick up after your inconsiderate ass. You think your behavior actually costs the company anything? You think they hire an extra person because of people like you? No. You just make some poor sap at the bottom of the pecking order that much more miserable
Congratulations on making yourself feel righteous at the expense of your fellow plebs
Sounds like they need to unionize and get paid enough to make it worth it then. There’s no moral obligation to do labor for corporations for free or under paid.
Lol “moral obligation”. You don’t do it because you’re obligated. You do it because it’s nice for the worker, and for the other customers who don’t want to navigate around your abandoned cart
No, it’s a job and you’re an entitled prick who thinks it magically happens. Supermarkets where I live make billions. They can definitely afford to pay low skilled workers, of which there are plenty, to do this work.
you’re entirely correct, but what people are also missing is: if the weather’s nice, getting outside and pushing carts is a welcome break to the fluorescent lights and other drudgery of the store…
anyone who’s ever actually worked a retail job will tell you that going outside every once in a while is pretty nice.
picking up trash in the rain sucks, but pushing a cart is leisurely compared to whatever else they’ll have you do.
We’re definitely on the same side. What many people see as an inconvenience is a job for many. I once had a boss who’s first company was a trolley collection company, he started from nothing, worked hard and sold it for $1m in Australia.
Sorry, I’ve become confused about what you mean by “here” or “there”, and where you are based.
You mean coins are required in America? Because not in Sweden. They used to be, like 20-15 years ago. But they removed that. Not sure if there was a law that came into effect or something but… not anymore with the coins. Carts are free to take into the store without coins. Still, everyone returns them.
I still do it without coins because that’s what I’ve done in my entire life. Like, not returning the cart never even entered my mind as a possibility (it’s still not one).
I’ve seen some un returned carts sporadically, but I’ve always assumed that there was some emergency.
On the Internet however? I’ve seen people argue that not returning carts is good for the economy because there’s people whose job is to return those, and if we did return the carts they would lose their job. Which is… Stupid to say the least.
We have absolutely enormous parking lots, and yeah, Americans are lazy and have an abundance of food. Maybe not more inconsiderate, but Hanlon’s Razor comes into play here. If you don’t believe me, just go to any Golden Corral. There absolutely will be multiple families in there where every single person weighs over 250 pounds, even the 8 year old kid.
I remember a girl in highschool that was an exchange student from Botswana(?) was a bit upset that she was too fat to go home after living here for a school year. She’d gained like maybe 5 pounds. As far as all us Americans were concerned she finally didn’t look anorexic.
My brothers and I would run around the parking lots gathering up all the carts rather than go into the store. This was especially fun at Aldi’s cause we got a quarter for each cart, and could get some candy.
Hanlon’s Razor comes into play here. If you don’t believe me
No no, I already believe that. I think that’s one of the most soothing and comforting adages ever. I suppose it’s just not in many Americans’ culture to think in terms of “what good can I be to society during my lifetime/today/in this situation,” rather than “how can I help myself/make the smallest burden for myself, right now”. I dunno.
I remember when I came to America for a few months, twice. I would gain a lot of weight both times. I thought it was quite frustrating. But cheap food really is bad for you.
Mostly Americans who don’t travel say this because they haven’t experienced lazy people in other countries. I’ve seen plenty of dumping of trash, destruction of natural places, etc in other countries.
Probably more in the continental Europe, right? Or further east? I feel like Scandinavian people are quite clean and take responsibility for trash. We have a good community system as well I think. Garbage is collected and disposed.
I dunno. Sometimes it bothers me how people don’t sort their trash correctly in the correct bins, like how hard is that? But at least they bring it there, right? 🤷♂️
HA! The Norwegians have terrible air quality because their mountains clog smoke in valleys. I noticed this when looking up the UKs and spotted my English city had better air quality than lots of Norway. Swedish hobgoblin motherfuckers.
What you get when no one is in charge. There are always people who will abuse a common trust. People will litter within feet of a trashcan or leave a cart a few spaces from a cart corral.
Personally I think shopping carts are the penultimate litmus test. Returning a shopping cart requires effort, albeit a miniscule amount of effort. The ultimate litmus test is litering. It requires exactly zero effort to not throw your trash on the ground or out your car window. To me, littering practically screams, “I don’t give a shit about anyone but myself. I have the self control of a toddler at bed time and I want everyone to know it which is why I throw my shit on the ground like a total fucktard.”
I’m not really a confrontational person but I have rolled down my window and yelled at people for throwing their cigarette butts on the ground. You would think some people were raised in a goddamn barn.
But there is a penalty for littering. Some people might refrain from littering not because it’s the right thing to do, but because they don’t want a fine.
The lack of repercussions for being a scumbag and abandoning your cart is what makes it a good test.
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