What really annoys me is when they ask if you want any help packing your shopping, when all your buying is toothpaste, or a loaf of bread or something. Do I look incapable?

And another thing. Do you want cashback? No. I would’ve asked if I wanted some extra money with my purchases. Are they on commission or something?

Oh, and another thing (I’ll stop in a minute). Why do they insist on handling your purchases with the severest distain? Cream cakes in a plastic container? Let’s turn them upside-down as they’re scanned just to see how much we can annoy the customer today. Well, honestly.

Are they on commission - yes!

Just as the banks swap 50p* to each other everytime you use someone else’s cash machine, the supermarket gets the 50p for giving you the cashback.

It also gets rid of some of that inconvenient cash stuff that otherwise at the end of the day the cashiers have to count and they have to pay Securicor to take it away.

(*It used to be 50p but that was some years ago)

I’m a bit confused by something. Simon states that he has “got a system for bag packing". Could this really be true? Could Simon actually do something so organised and logical (other than computer programming, of course)? Discuss…

Sad as it may be I too use a system of bagpacking related to the contents final destination. One bag contains all the stuff for the fridge another for the frezer another tins etc. This is probably a sympton of a deep psychological problem but at least I know am not alone.

Whats your system Simon ? once we have a few submissions we can compare and perhaps come up with the ultimate system for bag packing.

Heavy things at the bottom - tins of beens, lager etc. Fragile things at the top - eggs, chocolate eclaires.

Unfortunately for this to work properly you need to pack everything in the trolley in the reverse order, it being a first-in-last-out queue type thingy though.

Obviously that should have said tins of beans not beens.

Yes, and why is it that supermarkets in this country arrange all the heavy goods at the end of the shop (cans, lager, lemonade etc), and all the delicate stuff at the beginning (fruit, vegetables, eggs, bread etc)?

Now, in Germany…
(much more methodical ;))

I tried this but what happens when the trolley is full and the second layer of bags starts. With this system all of the eclairs eggs etc. are squished by the heavier items in the bags above.

Colin, I know it’s hard to believe that I have a system for anything, but it’s true. I wasn’t joking about putting my toothpaste in the freezer - once that’s happened you tend to be a bit more careful.

Mudplugger, my system is similar to yours, though the details vary depending on how much I’m buying for each location. I might have one bag for upstairs (bathroom, freezer) and one for downstairs (everything else), or one for the freezer and one for everything else… it varies from week to week, adding a whole dimension of excitement to the shopping experience.

I don’t really worry about the whole heavy-things-underneath issue. I tend to eat a lot of squashed food.

You keep your freezer upstairs?

Oh yes. It’s got its own bedroom.

Handy for midnight feasts (or Magnum greeds) I suppose!

In California, all (to my knowledge) supermarkets have people to pack your groceries. They will even take them to the car and pack it in that too!!
I’ve never had them take it to the car, as I’m always embarressed by the amount of shopping I have to fit in my little Geo Metro!! Also I nearly always have to wander up and down the car park looking for my tiny car which is hidden behind a huge SUV!

I also have a language difficulty!! I’d tell them to put it in the boot when they’re looking for the trunk!!

Of course I have a system too. Things that are heavy like tins and bottles go in the bag with the weakest handles. Things that have their own handles (like jumbo packs of loo rolls) go in a bag three sizes too small, so you can’t grab the bag’s handles together.

Finally, the ice creams you bought to eat when you get back to the car must be packed at the bottom of the bag with the hot roasted chicken in it, while the tissues and wetwipes are packed at the bottom of the bag with the frozen sprouts in it.