jlawrence01 wrote:
4) Can Costco and Trader Joes find at least SOME locally sourced products (i.e., within 100 miles of Chicagoland) to carry?

It would be very satisfying to find local produce at Costco -- and it would seem that the Costco business model, which involves carrying some items on an irregular basis (pending availability), could very easily adapt to the seasonal unpredictability of small farm output. Larger chains need a regular supply of stuff that always needs to be in stock -- Costco provides stuff at a good price, but you may not always find the same stuff there from one visit to the next.

Some of these big box stores accept ONLY checks (or cash -- but my guess is that most people pay with checks), and I'm sure they do that to reduce the expense of paying fees associated with credit cards (and thus the price of merchandise). Somehow, when most everyone is writing checks, it seems much less bothersome.

Hammond

David Hammond wrote:

jlawrence01 wrote:
4) Can Costco and Trader Joes find at least SOME locally sourced products (i.e., within 100 miles of Chicagoland) to carry?

It would be very satisfying to find local produce at Costco -- and it would seem that the Costco business model, which involves carrying some items on an irregular basis (pending availability), could very easily adapt to the seasonal unpredictability of small farm output. Larger chains need a regular supply of stuff that always needs to be in stock -- Costco provides stuff at a good price, but you may not always find the same stuff there from one visit to the next.

Some of these big box stores accept ONLY checks (or cash -- but my guess is that most people pay with checks), and I'm sure they do that to reduce the expense of paying fees associated with credit cards (and thus the price of merchandise). Somehow, when most everyone is writing checks, it seems much less bothersome.
Hammond

On Costco and TJs, I am not just talking about produce. They do NOT carry much Chicago sausage or bread or midwestern cheeses. The large chains do. Woodman's does. I am sure that any of the purveyors that a place like Woodman's could handle 50-100 TJs or Costco stores. And some of the East Coast stuff that TJs imports couldn't touch the quality of the local products.

BTW, Costco was sampling an organic sausage this weekend. The sales people gave a list of bad things that were not in the sausage. They should have added that it was tasteless, completely tasteless.

When my wife was in retailing (as an internal auditor for a national major retailer), auditing stopped in the Christmas season. What would she do? Collect bad checks. Each store would hand her an inch of bad checks (about 200) which would reflect a two month supply per store. She could collect on about 80% of them with a single call. I would argue that there is a cost related to accepting checks that is pretty similar to that of credit/debit cards.

jlawrence01 wrote:I would argue that there is a cost related to accepting checks that is pretty similar to that of credit/debit cards.

No doubt, but I guess check writing makes more sense for a store when it's pretty much the only way people pay. Basically, the store is able to charge less for merchandise by "charging" the customer with the inconvenience of writing checks (and, of course, the inconvenience of waiting patiently in line for others to write theirs).

Hammond

David Hammond wrote:No doubt, but I guess check writing makes more sense for a store when it's pretty much the only way people pay. Basically, the store is able to charge less for merchandise by "charging" the customer with the inconvenience of writing checks (and, of course, the inconvenience of waiting patiently in line for others to write theirs).

Hammond

Hammond,

FWIW, Costco takes American Express and maybe even debit cards. I always pay with AMX and I am out of there very quickly...once I have waited in line behind all the WCA's writing checks.

stevez wrote:, Costco takes American Express and maybe even debit cards.

FWIW, Costco does take debit cards.

stevez wrote:

David Hammond wrote:No doubt, but I guess check writing makes more sense for a store when it's pretty much the only way people pay. Basically, the store is able to charge less for merchandise by "charging" the customer with the inconvenience of writing checks (and, of course, the inconvenience of waiting patiently in line for others to write theirs).

Hammond

Hammond,

FWIW, Costco takes American Express and maybe even debit cards. I always pay with AMX and I am out of there very quickly...once I have waited in line behind all the WCA's writing checks.

I did not know that. Usually when I go to Costco, I follow The Wife around like a zombie, dazed by all the mountains of stuff, and she always pays with a check, so I figured that was the way it was done. I believe at Sam's Club there is not an option, though it wouldn't surprise me if debit cards were accepted, as they're basically automated checks.

Hammond

Yes, Costco takes debit cards.

jlawrence01 wrote:On Costco and TJs, I am not just talking about produce. They do NOT carry much Chicago sausage or bread or midwestern cheeses. The large chains do. Woodman's does. I am sure that any of the purveyors that a place like Woodman's could handle 50-100 TJs or Costco stores. And some of the East Coast stuff that TJs imports couldn't touch the quality of the local products.

I agree that there isn't a huge amount of local stuff at Costco, but there is a reasonable selection. Goose Island root beer (and regular beer), vienna beef sausages, sausages by amy, and local pierogies.

I'm not saying it couldn't be better, but it's not horribly dire. The Clybourn Costco even sells vienna beef hot dogs/polishes at their hot dog stand.

I'm not saying it couldn't be better, but it's not horribly dire. The Clybourn Costco even sells vienna beef hot dogs/polishes at their hot dog stand.

They don't in Glenview ... I guess being a stone's throw from the Vienna Factory at Clybourn makes a difference.

Regards,

gleam wrote:I'm not saying it couldn't be better, but it's not horribly dire. The Clybourn Costco even sells vienna beef hot dogs/polishes at their hot dog stand.

The Costco in Lake in the Hills sells a Sinai Kosher hot dog that is the worst got dog that I have ever had ... or at least since the Westward Ho in Las Vegas was bulldozed.

(Post revised to correct brand name.)

I confess......I will write a check once in a blue moon...usually the day before payday when I am flat broke. The longer processing time allows me to run to the bank the next day with my check to avoid a big bounce.
Sigh. Not a good thing I know and I do indeed feel guilty holding up the line.

Lo Siento!

HOLY CRIMINY

I just read that Westward Ho has been bulldozed?!!! I have fond memories of my stay there, complete with rust colored 70s shag carpet, footlong hotdogs *URP and "false top" shrimp cocktails for 99cents. They also had a "champagne" fountain!! WEEEEEEEEEEE all of the cold duck you could suck down before passing out!

Not only is the Westward Ho gone but the Stardust also bit the dust.

Imperial Palace is rumored to be next ...

And let's not forget the free daily ice cream social!!! Where else could you go to stay for a week for just two hunnert bucks TOTAL?!! I tell ya!

Last night I managed to make a WCA of myself with a debit card at Walgreen's. The machine said "ATM CREDIT EBT" and I wasn't sure if my debit card was technically an ATM card, and the initials "EBT" included at least three letters from the word "debit," so I picked EBT and was, of course, wrong, and the friendly cashier had to start over.

Also, I thought Ramon's post was hilarious, and nodded knowingly when he got to the "receipt nazi" part - they are infuriating. Aren't they supposed to have a sensor above the door that lets them know when merchandise has been stolen? Argh.

I will say, though, re Costco-- twice in recent times I've had them doublecheck that I in fact had some item which was buried under other items, and which I had been charged for. So I don't mind the receipt checking as a policy.

Saint Pizza wrote: I thought Ramon's post was hilarious

Thank you, Saint Pizza. While I normally have a thick skin, a number of situations this season have brought me down, and I needed the compliment.

I could handle my post (possibly) being called mean, racist, sexist, petty, unpleasant, hypocritical, and in violation of LTH guidelines. I could not get over it being called “unfunny.”

People, please remember, no one is getting paid for this stuff, not the writers or the moderators. Yes we all have opinions and data worth sharing. None of it is worth a damn if it isn’t entertaining and that takes genuine effort, even if it misses the mark for some on occassion.

-ramon

Ramon wrote:

Saint Pizza wrote: I thought Ramon's post was hilarious

Thank you, Saint Pizza. While I normally have a thick skin, a number of situations this season have brought me down, and I needed the compliment.

I could handle my post (possibly) being called mean, racist, sexist, petty, unpleasant, hypocritical, and in violation of LTH guidelines. I could not get over it being called “unfunny.”

People, please remember, no one is getting paid for this stuff, not the writers or the moderators. Yes we all have opinions and data worth sharing. None of it is worth a damn if it isn’t entertaining and that takes genuine effort, even if it misses the mark for some on occassion.

-ramon

I wasn't going to chime in because I felt Ramon could take the punches however, I found nothing out of line with the original post.

I allude to certain gorge-raising "political" proclivities on the splinter "p-slap" thread...

EDIT:

certain site users appear hellbent on relating discourse to old-skool binary oppositions

dialectically, barf me out

yes we are bound by our essential genitals and skins

and yet we aren't, we're nominal

as WSB so astutely opined post-Korzybski: language is a virus...he meant it differently, but every child knows the phrase...sticks and stones...

---

it's called reverse-approbation: you take it, eat it, and spit it out

not everything is an attack
not everything is inedible

Saint Pizza wrote:Also, I thought Ramon's post was hilarious, and nodded knowingly when he got to the "receipt nazi" part - they are infuriating. Aren't they supposed to have a sensor above the door that lets them know when merchandise has been stolen? Argh.

I don't think apples and other items can be tagged in a way that could be detected by a sensor.

I'm not sure why shrinkage would be more of an issue at Costco than at other food retail places -- maybe because there's so much seeming chaos at the register that it'd be easier for unscrupulous folks to sneak out with stuff. Or maybe other stores, unlike Costco, have the cost of shrinkage built into the price.

Hammond

It seems like shrinkage should be, if anything, lower at Costco. It's not very easy to hide a 3.5lb tub of pretzels under your coat, for instance

Ramon wrote:People, please remember, no one is getting paid for this stuff, not the writers or the moderators. Yes we all have opinions and data worth sharing. None of it is worth a damn if it isn’t entertaining and that takes genuine effort, even if it misses the mark for some on occassion.

Ramon,

I think there is plenty of information on this board which is intellectually interesting. It may not be satirical nor even challenge people's boundaries of tastes, it is full of solid content without any thought of entertaining. I find those contributions very worthy of my time to read and consider.

Trying to make every post a moment of high humor is a stretch and perhaps not even necessary. Often those opinions and data sharing is quite captivating on its own.

Regards,

C2,

Not to split hairs, but I think the definition of "entertainment" goes beyond just the humorous. There are many entertaining posts that are clever and funny (MikeG's Bones post comes to mind) and many posts that make little attempt at humor but are hugely entertaining (like Pigmon's carne en su jugo survey).

I honestly find myself agreeing with both you and Ramon -- the word in contention is "entertainment," which can be broadly defined as anything that "amuses, pleases, or diverts." And certainly we prefer posts that do those things and that, as Ramon points out, "take genuine effort" (slapdash and opaque postings seem to serve little purpose except, perhaps, to please the perpetrator in some odd way).

Hammond

Hammond,

There are plenty of people who are, "Just the fact's, sir," types whose contributions have value, which Ramon asserts, "None of it is worth a damn if it isn’t entertaining..."

As for opaqueness, that stuff is the ying-yang of moderation. Someone spends an inordinate amount of time hiding something in plain view, which then costs moderator time to clean it up. Political-stuff is more often than not what people insist on cleverly disguising, especially when our posting guidelinesspecifically ask them not to. It is not entertaining and a waste of time to stop those trains once they are out of the station.

Regards,

Cathy2 wrote:There are plenty of people who are, "Just the fact's, sir," types whose contributions have value, which Ramon asserts, "None of it is worth a damn if it isn’t entertaining..."

If Ramon is saying that only humorous posts are entertaining, then I disagree with him, but I don't think he's saying that.

My point is that entertainment is a gigantic category of experience that includes but is not limited to humor. I am going through a History of the Great War right now that I find very entertaining, but very low on laughs (I'm up to 1918; none yet).

A "just the facts"post can please very much, thus making it "entertaining," at least by the standard definition of the word.

Hammond

If we split these hairs any further, we're going to need a microscope.

What was this thread about again?

Oh yeah. I hate checks too.

eatchicago wrote:Oh yeah. I hate checks too.

You know what else I find aggravating, as you bring it up: change. I don't mean like evolution or the passing of time, I mean like pocket change: dimes, quarters, hard coinage like that.

My sense is that many people reflexively discard pennies (I usually try to give them back or donate them to St. Jude right there at the counter). I used to collect coins as a kid, so I have an aesthetic appreciation for stamped metal used as currency, but I shudder to see coinage coming at me -- it weighs down the pockets or purse and is generally worth so little. Maybe if one could still buy a cup of joe for dime I'd feel differently.

Any how, coins. Who needs 'em? To avoid them I would even...write a check.

David Hammond wrote:
You know what else I find aggravating, as you bring it up: change. I don't mean like evolution or the passing of time, I mean like pocket change: dimes, quarters, hard coinage like that.

You know what? I've got to agree with you. Up until someone slipped me a car wash token masquerading as a quarter in some change I got yesterday, I probably would have not had an opinion one way or the other.

If you have not seen this commercial yet, it is fascinating and (to me) very entertaining:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wVdfeSxJ2nM

It's funny, because a casual lunch place like the one featured in the commercial would have stumbled over a credit/debit card just 5 or 6 years ago, preferring cash. This was back in the day when many CC machines relied on a dial-up connection. I used to be the WCA using my credit card, which would take longer than paying with cash. My, how technology can turn the tables...

If we split these hairs any further, we're going to need a microscope.

Now THAT'S funny!

magpie1140 wrote:If you have not seen this commercial yet, it is fascinating and (to me) very entertaining:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wVdfeSxJ2nM

It's funny, because a casual lunch place like the one featured in the commercial would have stumbled over a credit/debit card just 5 or 6 years ago, preferring cash. This was back in the day when many CC machines relied on a dial-up connection. I used to be the WCA using my credit card, which would take longer than paying with cash. My, how technology can turn the tables...

Imagine how much chaos would have been caused if the hapless luncher had written a check.

I would really rather use a credit card most times, but if my purchase is really small or if I'm at a little store that is probably struggling anyway (and thus more likely to feel the pain of paying some points on a credit card purchase), I'll pay cash and, reluctantly, take the change.

Hammond

HI,

Twenty years ago, credit cards were an American-thing and a travel convenience. I remember going to a department store in Zurich, Switzerland to buy some clothing before heading back to Eastern Europe. I pulled out my credit card, which caused quite a flurry! Someone had to go to the chief accountants office to get the credit card processing machine and forms. When the cashier processed my card, other girls from the floor came to watch how it was done.

If I had written a check, signed a cashier's check or paid in cash, then I would have been on the street at least 10 minutes faster.

Regards,