Eating in the supermarket

[tallulah]

As an aside from my other thread about children misbehaving in shops- the other thing that wound me up yesterday is this trend for letting children eat in the supermarket. The child in the trolley at the next till had a bag of grapes she'd been eating. She must have had 1/2 lb, so that's about 50p? Would her mother have thought it OK to give her, say, a twix, or a Begian Bun without paying for it?

I don't agree with this on 3 counts

1. people shouldn't be eating in any shop & teaching a child that they can is not a good idea
2. this is theft & if everyone did it then the supermarkets losses would be passed on to everyone
3. children also should be taught that you can't have something until it's paid for.

Before you all jump on me and say it's better than having them screaming, I have got 4 myself & I have been through this. Mine quickly learned that no screaming inside meant they could get to eat a treat outside when we'd finished.

Our local ASDA and Sainsburys have no problems with children having something from a pre-paid or barcoded product. So long as you pay obviously. I wouldn't wat mysef. As I said I generally take snacks anyway but if shopping on way home from nursery it can be hard.

How do you stop the carpark ticket going soggy??

Xausted I had this when Iceland delivered some groceries. They gave me an extra 3 bags of shopping.They were full of meat and ice-cream. I phoned the store to tell them what had happened and that the bags were in my freezer ready for collection. (I felt very guilty that someone was missing out on there shopping)They thanked me for my honesty and told me to keep it.

Lol @ tomps, snickers and oxocube! This thread is hilarious. OK, get this then, a friend of mine used to take her kids to the local Toys R Us just so they could take all the toys off the shelves and play with them She had no intention of buying anything in there, ever, it just killed a couple of hours on a dull afternoon...Now, where do you put the shopping list if you've had to take it out of your mouth to neck a few grapes?

You just kinda hold it between your lips/teeth. Don't put the whole thing in your mouth though as this will probably dissolve all the ink on it. If the theory of evolution was true we'd all have an extra pair of hands then we wouldn't have a problem with where to put tickets.

Soupdragon, the secret is to keep it between your teeth, not actually in your mouth, so you end up driving round the car park with a really silly wide grin on your face. Something like this !

Sorry our posts crossed XAusted. I'm so slow tonight.

I always find that my mouth starts to water uncontrollably, either because I'm paranoid about getting the ticket soggy or because I've not eaten enough food in the supermarket.

I frequently used to get to the checkout with some of the shopping wrecked, eg, loaves of bread squashed, boxes of cornflakes torn, due to ds "helping" me. The checkout operators always offered to replace the damaged items but I was always too honest to accept. One time I had some prepacked cheese with huge teethmarks in. They didn't offer to replace that for some reason.

Actually, eating in the supermarket is probably safer than what I do which is to eat in the car (after I've taken the ticket out of my mouth, of course). I'm always starving after shopping so I'm always scoffing something at the wheel. Could distract me from my otherwise perfect driving. Also means car gets full of crumbs.

I know some people who go clothes shopping and try on loads of dresses without ever meaning to buy a thing!!

oh what would I give for children who would eat and shut up! Mine love supermarket shopping, love food full stop, love throwing the wrong sorts of goodies into my trolly, love climbing in and out of the trolly while it is moving (youngest one), love (like scummy's sons) debating loudly about the relative merits of breakfast cereals, love running all over the place to hunt out the pancake mix, bananas and chocolate sauce (current favourite meal) love interrogating the assistants. Eating food while on their adventure is the last thing on their minds.

I have heard of somebody taking back staff to a well known shop after 6 years! It was an umbrella they had received as a present and she decided she did not really like it afterwards...

Still on supermarkets but off track from the eating... does anyone else hate those car shaped trolleys in Tescos? The worst tantrums I ever got from DS2 were because he had to get out of them at the end. (and he still needed his wholemeal bread roll from pre-packed pre-priced pack of 4 to keep him quiet)

happyspider did she get it changed????

I'll tell you what's worse, Soupdragon, and that's those little child size trollies for kiddies to push round Asda. They have a flag with a witty slogan like "trainee shopper" on. 3 year olds with their own trollies are lethal.

XAusted, they used to have those in Sainsburys (pre children for me) and I could not work out why they thought it was a good idea!

Now, do the parents pay for the contents of this little trolleys or just abandon them at the checkout...

HappySpider - had to laugh at you taking back 'staff' after 6 years! Weren't they working hard or something!

soupdragon those bloody cars are head wrecking arent they. My ds whos 2 used to throw a tantrum (not going into that one again heehee)if he could not get in one. Plus what makes it worse is they dont hold alot of shopping.Worst thing tesco done IMO

This is brilliant !
Done Internet shopping; also 'smash & grab' style, ie dd sits in trolley and I get speed awards hoping no-one notices the noise; feed my way around the store like most of you and now at almost 4, we seem to have entered 'civilisation' (not that it will last, I've no illusions).
Dd likes racing around collecting apples, peppers etc and knows where most of our things are (Mummy, I can't reach dad's beer..) but her willingness to help is DIRECTLY proportional to my stress/hormone levels, if I'm in a bad way most of our supermarket will be checking out NSPCC phone numbers because she knows how to really make her mark. All the people who smile and go 'ah' when she's being, in her words 'a really useful engine' are the first to 'tutt' and 'hiss' when I'm throwing my dummy

I let my ds have his own little trolley just once. Had to take it off him somewhere in the fresh meats aisle because he thought it was a bumper car. He had a huge paddy and I had to go home before I could finish my shopping.

Yes Soupdragon. We encountered those on our very first shopping trip with DS2. DS1 was desperate for one and couldn't understand that we couldn't use one as it had nowhere for DS2. Not so good when he was feeling a bit fragile and I would have loved to have treated him to a ride in one.

One of the shopping centres in our town has little cars for young children which you can borrow to push round the shops instead of a buggy. They're quite fun and have a big net bag on the handlebar for your shopping. As a security measure, you have to get your child a "driving licence", complete with photo, before you can take one away and leave your buggy behind.

Message withdrawn

edgarcat, bet you don't hold pegs in your mouth when your putting your washing out either. Obviously very well brung up.