Giant Grocery Curbside Pickup

Grocery shopping for us has changed. I never liked grocery shopping anyway. Since March we have been ordering on line to have our groceries delivered to our door rather than go inside a store. Primarily we use the neighbors Giant, but have also tried Instacart. What I like about ordering through the store is that store employees are processing the order rather than any individual who does the shopping which can be hit and miss. This month we decided to try curbside pick up starting with Safeway, last week Harris Teeter, and yesterday Giant. Each place has its positives and negatives. Harris Teeter had covered parking, my favorite angel food cake, and an app that you can request special items and make comments about specificities on items, but paper bags are used where we prefer plastic to reuse. Safeway has outdoor spaces marked, plastic bags, our favorite bread, but once you complete your order you can’t update it if you forgot something. Giant allows you to update your order, is only three blocks away, has outdoor spaces with signage that says no tipping, and paper bags. We had a snafu with Harris Teeter which delayed pickup for 45 minutes, but the attention we got was extremely professional from Simone to fix it. It’s also the furthest location from us. Safeway was straight forward without any problems. Giant gave us a case of water bottles that we didn’t order and didn’t have cucumbers, but the process was fine. All in all, picking up groceries works quite well and gives us an opportunity to get out of the house aside from our morning walks. It’s nice to know we have so many options. A new Wegman’s will be opening next month. After it’s been open for a while we might give it a try it. It’s rare to get everything on the list from any of the stores, but for the most part it works quite well. 

Harris Teeter Grocery Curbside Pick up

Wegman’s new store will be opening soon. We live a couple of blocks from Giant, and Safeway and Harris Teeter are all options. We have been having groceries delivered from Giant since March, along with a couple of Instacart deliveries from Fresh Market. We thought it might be time to experiment with curbside pickup. I prefer using the grocery in house staff rather than a random Instacart delivery person, so I now have apps for all the above. There are some items you can only get at one or the other place and that determines who we order from. Angel food cake is something that’s been difficult to find and get - but Harris Teeter had it available on their app menu. So I ordered groceries from them this week and found out you are able to add comments about a specific item as well as request something that may not be on the menu. You can also add to the order if you forgot something - Safeway doesn’t. The curbside pick up however, was tricky. I called the store before three to let them know we were on the way, hoping to avoid unnecessary delay. It’s nice that the pick up is covered in a garage in case of inclement weather, but the process is a bit less organized for “express lane” because you need to push a button, give your name, and hope someone will be there shortly. For whatever reason, they didn’t have our order - not under our name, but finally found it under our number. After forty five minutes of waiting, they were finally delivered. In the meantime about 5-6 other customers came and went. I would like to shout out to Simone, who handled our situation with great efficiency and politeness. She also made sure we got the senior discount and five more dollars off for the mishap. She also said Thursdays are the busiest days to pick up groceries due to the senior discount. We ended up paying more in tips for the superb service, but it was worth having the opportunity to meet such a wonderful person. We don’t care for the paper bags, but best of all, we got my angel food cake. Next time we will wait for the email that tells us the groceries are ready. 

Total Wine Curbside Pickup

We have a half a glass of red wine every evening. It’s a habit we have had for a very long time. It’s one of the few things us “older folks” can still enjoy. We don’t do much of anything else these days. Since we only order grocery delivery since March, it’s difficult to add wine to the list. So, we have been ordering wine by the case from Total Wine and having it delivered. But picking it up in the lobby is awkward having to show an ID, etc. After two rounds of that, we decided to give curbside pick up a try. I ordered a case and got a really great deal. First of all the wine is quite cheap, and it got even cheaper by ordering 12. Without a delivery fee and tip it got even cheaper. We got an email this morning saying the purchase was ready for pick up and to follow the instructions on the sign when we arrive. After our morning walk we got in the car and drove just a couple of blocks to the store. We pulled in to a designated curbside parking space, texted the number, our name and parking space. They asked for the order number and within a few minutes the wine was delivered to the car - of course - only after they saw my ID. Luckily it was a dry day. It might be dicey if it’s pouring rain. I think my husband prefers the pickup. If it wasn’t for the ID I still prefer the delivery.