returns at wal*mart

What compels people to go to a place such as Wal*Mart and return a perishable food item? This has kind of been an ongoing topic of conversation around here in the past and again more recently. Of all the times I have shopped in an actual grocery store, I have never seen people return a food item. I can understand if you bought a new carton of milk and the expiry date was still good, but once you opened it you smelled that it was sour. That happens and quite possibly could be an acceptable return (although I personally would just throw it out and go buy some more).

When we were last in Virginia my good friend Aimee told me she had seen people in Wal*Mart returning, get this, chocolates and balloons the day after Valentine's. Were they rejected on that special day? Did someone just decide some cash would be handier than making a loved one happy? I think the entire concept is truly bizarre.

My Aunt Gina bought a cake in the Wal*Mart bakery last year for her husband's birthday. When they sliced it and took a bite, it was horrible. She said the icing had no taste; it was dreadful. So she took it back. She was embarassed about it, seeing how three slices were missing, but the bakery woman told her a few batches of icing had been made without enough sugar. I, too, would have made such a return.

The thing that I am getting at though is this: food that has been brought home and then returned only to be re-stocked later on. That birthday cake would have been trashed, not resold to some unsuspecting customer. Aim�e said they have a small refrigerator at her local Wal*mart to keep perishables fresh and thus are able to be re-stocked later. However, our local Wal*Mart does not have this little convenience and when you go into the Cutosmer Service area, especially on a busy day, you can see all kinds of meats and frozen items stacked up in trolleys or on the back counter. I had hoped these items would be thrown out, but Sunday I found out otherwise.

We had gone shopping for groceries. I had to make an exchange on a shirt of Clare's, and while waiting in line, saw a huge packet of rack o' ribs lying on the back counter. One of the employees asked another what is was, and she replied with, "It's some rack o'ribs! And it has been sitting there since early this morning. It needs to go back."

I was hoping that "go back" meant go somewhere way in the back of store, i.e.: DUMPSTER. But the other girl picked it up and said, "Yeah I'll take it back to the shelf." When I was done with my exchange I went to meet up with Greg and Clare and the girl was indeed placing the meat back in the meat section.

As Ross, Aimee's husband, pointed out, surely there should be some FDA or USDA laws applying to the re-shelving of meat, even if it just so made it as far as the person's grocery bag before they decided they just didn't want that rack o'ribs.

And seeing how these ribs had been sitting on the counter for God knows how long, and who knows how long the customer had it....it could have been in their car overnight. They could have dropped it. Their dog could have drooled on it. They could have injected it with some illegal drugs. I mean WHO KNOWS WHAT HAPPENED TO THAT MEAT. And some unsuspecting person is going to see them sitting oh-so-inviting on the shelf and say, "MMMMM, ribs, I think I will buy those!!"

The very thought makes me feel ill.

Along these same lines, we did the ultimate and returned some olives yesterday. Greg had been dying for olives since I never buy them...I can't stand them. After we brought them home he dove in only to find there was no "pop" when he unscrewed the metal top. That means they had been opened. And maybe some person had opened them in the store, inserted their dirty fingers, eaten a couple, then left the jar in the cereal aisle for it to only be re-shelved later that night by another Wal*Mart employee.

We weren't taking any chances and returned said olives the next day. And no, we did not get another jar.