Supermarket Etiquette

Why do perfectly normal people lose their mind in a supermarket? Why do intelligent, sophisticated men and women with responsible positions, lifetime achievements – even powerful people in finance and business, lay leaders and educators, act so brazenly and bizarrely in a supermarket or department store?

Which of the following behaviors can you relate to?

You have important company for Shabbos or Yom Tov and your mission is to purchase a beautiful roast or a lean cut rack of lamb chops. The butcher comes out with a fresh batch and you take it out of his hand or wagon before he has a chance to put it into the freezer. A woman near you says, “Those were prepared for me, I was waiting for that.” The butcher confirms this. Oblivious to her comments and his, you keep the beautiful roast and walk away. After all, you have important company for Shabbos and Yom Tov.

Another circumstance surely all of us have witnessed: We are standing on line at a cashier dutifully and patiently waiting our turn. There are three cashiers, each with a line several people long. Suddenly, another cashier opens up right next to you. Courtesy dictates that the next person on line goes first. This may be the person before you, or even you. But, from the corner of your eye, you see the last person at the back of the longest line, who just arrived, quickly maneuver her way in. “Oh, I’m so sorry, my mother’s in the car ... The plumber is waiting for me ... I’ve really never done this before… I must go to the manicurist …You don’t mind do you … Thanks so much.” She does not seem to notice the venomous stares from all others who have the same obligations and commitments awaiting them. Come to think of it, since stores have special lines for express or cash only, maybe we can have one line designated for the impetuous or impatient? Sixty items or less, no waiting.

Have you been at Costco lately with your full shopping cart waiting on line wondering why that woman in front of you is standing there with no cart? You know where this is going. A moment later, her husband arrives with an overloaded basket that will now set you back another 10-15 minutes. So while you were obeying the rules, others were not.

Remember how you hated being pinched on your cheek by an uncle? Why do you do that to a tomato? You get very annoyed at the double parked cars on 13th Avenue or both sides of Central Avenue, slowing traffic, yet you do the same with a friend, stopping to talk in an aisle with your side-by-side wagons creating an obstacle course and making it impossible for others to pass.

Don’t you get furious at the person blocking your car in who ran into the cleaners or the ATM for just a minute and blocked your car from getting out of your parking spot? But what about leaving your cart at the register and going back to pick up just five more items across the store? Yes, indeed; we courteous, generous, refined people seem to lose all sense of balance in a supermarket.

I am the average person, your next-door neighbor. We’ve seen each other in Brachs, Pomegranate, Gourmet Glatt, Amazing Savings, CVS, Costco - in many stores and at many counters. Though I write tongue-in-cheek, you also know I am serious about my observations.

But I don’t want to be taken too seriously lest you are reluctant to hitch your son’s wagon to my daughter’s wagon, hence, my anonymity, and besides, could I afford to be stared at in a store by the many who believe I was actually directing my comments at them? Could I afford to openly give mussar when I myself am not guilt-free?

Therefore, I offer all of us the following recommendations for store regulations and shoppers’ code of conduct:

1.One-Way Aisles: Convert all aisles into North or South to ease traffic congestion. All even numbered aisles should face the registers; all odd numbered aisles should be directed away from the register.

2.Tall Carts: Shopping carts should be redesigned to be narrower and taller enabling three-cart passage in an aisle instead of the current two.

3.Pinch-Free Zone: All supermarket customers will be issued a card with a bar code. This card will be scanned upon entering vulnerable-to-pinching- and-squeezing areas such as the produce section and fresh chicken case.

Customers will be permitted one pinch of tomatoes measuring no more than two millimeters in depth, one smell of cantaloupe from a distance of no less than four inches and one press of a fresh, whole pullet with the thumb only. Any violation of these guidelines will result in the respective item being automatically scanned onto your bill.

4.Red Zone: Once a cart has passed through the one-way turnstile and has entered the red zone of the checkout area, the shopper cannot breach this secured zone and re-enter the aisles.

5.Cell phone usage in the red zone should be banned enabling shoppers to unload their carts with two hands and at a quicker pace.

6.Cashiers and baggers will interact only with customers and not with each other. They will stop exchanging personal stories about their social lives, who they are angry with, and why they have to work the late shift today.

These simple guidelines will surely create an esprit di corps heretofore not witnessed in supermarkets and will produce a new, improved type of shopping experience for all to enjoy their never before squeezed tomatoes.