Wow I’ve never seen that. I have seen at our local produce market a sign on the big enormous (expensive) strawberry quarts that if you tamper with the package (switch out strawberries or add more or whatever) that they will charge you more per pound)
If the selection of fruit in a package doesn’t look to my standards I don’t buy it!
For the non-weighed bags of fruit that someone rearranged (to improperly get more) - with that kind of thing - I sort of feel that person has to go home being the one who would ‘cheat at fruit’ - that’s almost punishment enough!
I am glad I wasn’t wrong in my reaction to this. I also choose fruit from the bottom boxes so it hasn’t been picked through. I know my fruit has been touched and I am going to wash it anyway, but I feel like the more it is handled, the greater the chance that it ends up bruised or the container opens and spills, or I end up purchasing less than the weight advertised because someone else has over-filled a container or picked all the largest fruit for their bag.
People who help themselves to grapes/cherries irritate me. That is petty theft that they’re doing in plain sight. If you absolutely must try it before you purchase it, ask someone for permission in the produce department. So many times I see someone just standing there, helping themselves, and never grabbing a bag to purchase, they just think this kind of theft is fine.
And does one really need to taste these to see if they’re acceptable? You can see if these fruits are moldy, squishy, you can press them through the bag to see if they’re firm. Grapes and cherries that look good will almost always taste good. Don’t be a thief. And eating unwashed fruit? Gross.
Holy guac. Just realized that the jar of marinated herring I bought at Costco has been opened and put back on the shelf. Yuck. I’m not going to bother with return of a $5 item, but will be super vigilant next time. Some people have no shame!!!
One doesn’t really know what any produce will taste like before purchasing it. Why not ask permission? And really, how often when you taste grapes, do you decide they’re unacceptable? One takes their chances with every sort of produce, that it might be bland or not the perfect taste.
I was thinking the same thing. Do people taste apples before they buy them?
Farmer’s Markets where they have samples set aside are different. And just because a vendor at a Farmer’s Market has a bowl of samples, doesn’t mean that it is okay to sample the same product in grocery stores. During the holidays, Lindt is at Costco passing out samples of candy. That doesn’t mean I can open a package of Lindt at the grocery store to sample on my own.
If the worst thing I do in the grocery store is sample a grape that I’m uncertain about (and let me tell you, I truly am fussy about grapes! I don’t want to throw away a pound of grapes that look pretty but upon touching/biting are soft - I can only eat them super firm) I stand ready to take any gruff from a store employee about sampling it.
No I’m not going to take a peach- but I am going to feel a few before I pick my selection. And I’ve gotten burned many times that the taste was not good, at all. I know with a full peach - a 1/2 pound of a product that I take chances. One grape out of dozens in a pound? I call no foul.
Also one unwashed grape probably not gonna kill me!
Produce for sure does get manhandled. More than I guess we’d like to know when we buy. But that is sort of the nature of produce. We learn to touch, taste, etc. to make a good choice.
Should I sample 10 grapes in a bunch? No. Should I move berries from package to package? No.
We could have a whole thread on what products we see people munching on at the grocery store!
I was in Whole Foods awhile ago, and I saw a woman and her daughter merrily munching their way through the fruit section eating apples, pears. She was well dressed, had a French accent (just a guess). I told an employee about it, who shook her head and sighed, don’t know if she did anything about it. I rarely see theft in this area, so that was surprising.
I’ve read that the largest source of theft at grocery stores isn’t stealing produce or other food items, but people who go through the self checkout and don’t scan items, or ring up organic (and higher priced) food as non organic. So some stores are actually closing the self checkout stands.
That would make me happy! I hate self checkout unless I have a very few items. And our store has very few full-service lanes open anymore. One night there were NONE open. Ugh.