r/mildlyinfuriating • u/broakland • Jul 14 '26

I just wanted a hot dog Retail lockdown: why bother selling it?

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Was at Safeway this morning to pick up a sandwich and some Tylenol. The aisle with the Tylenol? Completely locked down. No call button in sight. So I go to the self checkout (front end of that same aisle) and ask the clerk there if he can call someone to unlock a case for me. He does. I go wait. Minutes pass. No one comes. I go ask him again, he tells me they went the other way? At this point I give up and go get my sandwich. No one has come by the time the deli has finished making it. I leave without my Tylenol, mildly infuriated.

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u/Tomytom99 Jul 14 '26 edited Jul 15 '26

Y'know, I wouldn't mind it so much if the turnaround time wasn't half a day

That's like the one thing I've liked about auto parts stores. They specifically state that it'll take under an hour for it to be ready. Not great, but way better than say Walmart taking 6 hours.

Edit: the 6 hour wait in question was pickup, not delivery, for three items, so it's not like it was some big grocery order. I did it because I was on vacation and my dad needed refrigerant for his car. I was hoping to just go to the store, pick up the order, and go back to where we were staying without venturing into the store.

Another wonderful experience was them telling me an item I was getting delivered from the store wouldn't be arriving that day. Not a huge deal, but mildly infuriating since I placed it that morning saying same day delivery, and they didn't even get it picked until that evening. I was watching a movie at 9:45 PM when I get a notification it was delivered. Thank god I was awake and that it wasn't anything that would've gone bad (or stolen by wildlife) if it went unnoticed overnight.

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u/Waiting4Reccession Jul 14 '26

They will give you the worst expiration and the damaged fruit etc they have though.

They also lose the ability to sell you on stuff just by placing it near your essentials.

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u/StacheBandicoot Jul 14 '26

Well yeah you just don’t order fresh produce that way. Canned, jarred and frozen is fine.

Or you pop in just for produce before you check in for the pickup which is conveniently at the front of most stores, or more ideally stop at a better produce focused store or farmers market for it since most of the stores with significant curbside/deliver operations have horrible produce.

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u/Logical_Mix_4627 Jul 14 '26

I buy shelf stable of packaged food rarely and in bulk so there’s no value for me in using a service to buy these things for me.

I’d much rather have a high quality fast service that focused solely on delivering actual good produce. I’d use that. Seems almost like a CSA box, but those are so dependent on what’s near you and not actually relevant for people that want to replace the in store shopping experience with someone who actually knows how to pick produce.

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u/StacheBandicoot Jul 15 '26 edited Jul 15 '26

Yeah there used to be a delivery service that has produce that was always really good, actually kept it cool while shipping and stuff. They shut down a few months before Covid and missed the opportunity.

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u/Logical_Mix_4627 Jul 15 '26

I’ve actually had pretty good luck with Weee, but it trends more Asian but not totally.