Unfortunately many people fall into one or more of these categories: fat/dumb/lazy .

You like a sporting challenge? Do you take the time to read the lay of the land or just toss and hope for the best?

Yes, that is a pet peeve for me. I mean, it really is not difficult to put the carts where they belong instead of leaving them in a parking spot :mad:

I remember years ago, going to look at a toolbox that was listed in the local paper, at a trailer park a few blocks from a grocery store. Well, I had never been back there, even though it was near my local store, hell, I didn't even know it was back there.
Almost as soon as I turned in, I noticed that there were like 50 shopping carts (literally) parked near the entrance, but out of view from the main road. All I could think of was what a bunch of lazy MFers.

i saw a family pushing their groceries down the road I assume to their hotel (I also assume tourists) since there was a hotel right there and no houses.

im sure they did not return them.

The carts, which typically cost between $75 and $150 each, with some models costing $300–400, are removed by people for various purposes. To prevent theft, estimated at $800 million worldwide per annum, stores use various security systems

The Mrs. Says target has wheel locks that engage if you try to remove the cart.

I'm a rider if the surface is smooth enough. It's fun. And it's the cart back to the coral

I never shop for groceries, my *****es do that:D

For the past 18 months I have been taking a friend of mine grocery shopping once every two weeks.

I drop him off up front at the Giant and then park and wait for him in the car. I get a lot of work done while I wait. I have become an expert at parking lot/shopping cart etiquette.

A few observations:

- The "eyeball liberty" in a grocery store parking lot is really, really excellent; from a freak show to a fashion show. Key is don't stare no matter how freakish or how excellent the passing parade.

- Giant has the shopping cart return stands in the parking lot, nicely spaced out and very convenient. Only about 50% of the carts find their way INSIDE the return stands, which are railed spaces about the size of a parking spot.

- There is no handy demographic as to who does or doesn't return the carts.

- My favorite are the guys (I have never seen a woman do this) surf the cart into the stand at speed standing on the back bar and the guys that take aim from about ten yards away and let the cart fly on its own, like Varmint!

Spectacular stuff.

Cart surfer here !

Same here :D

Sure there is, Lazy MFers...

I've failed because the cart ran out of steam heading towards the intend target. Grease the bearings, please.

I surf

People who do not return the shopping cart
 

I also try to park close to the corral knowing I’ll return it there. I can think of one particular instance when I did not.

Was in South Florida for vaca with family. We didn’t want to even be tempted driving during our stay so no rental car. My BIL and I walked to Publix and got carried away with our shopping and we had too much to carry back. We decided to be “that guy” and take the cart back to our rental and then bring it back.

Evidently this is a problem there and they had a solution I didn’t know existed. There are brakes on the cart that trip at the curb line of the parking lot.

Fortunately the owner of the rental lived next door and came to pick us up in her Cadillac Brougham. The cart stayed at the curb line with the brakes locked.

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Sergio! My favorite golfer.

I have seen it, not as well done, but it is fun to watch.

Good to know the value.

A local grocery now uses locking wheels activated by a trip wire embedded in the parking lot asphalt. Easy to circumvent.
(The 'borrowers' were imported techies too stupid or cheap to buy a better rolling hand cart. Or buy a freaking bicycle in this local bike capitol. Duh. Did I say duh?)
The store used to send out pickup trucks filled with carts in the bed to collect from known spots.
I'd drive along and see half a dozen women pushing shopping carts down the road some days.

Me? I gaffled one out of an apartment dumpster, cut off the top, and made a nice engine stand.

Go to an Albertsons or a Kroger, usually there are ghetto apts. near by, and folks just push the carts home after shopping. Walk around the ghetto apts and you will see shopping carts. LOL!

I like the carts that are turned on their side so people can sit on them at the bus stops.

So do you leave your clothes in the fitting room or return them to the racks?

I buy and return if needed.

I took my wife to the Dr the other day and wasn't allowed in due to Covid. There's an Aldi's in the same plaza, well around back, but anyway, i was done shopping before she was done in the Dr's office so i sat in my car waiting. I made $2.25 returning carts that people just left by their parking spot. It wasn't the money, I was bored, but I made $2.25.:)

When I was but a yoot I had a 63 Dodge D-100 beater. Some of my miscreant friends also had beaters and we would find a shopping cart out by itself in the lot and punt it back and forth across the lot with our trucks. It actually took a bit of skill to launch it a fair distance.

Runaway carts are precisely why I park the Taco on the uphill edge of the lot and walk the 40 ish yards to the store.

It's flat here (no pun intended) so I always go for the shade! ;)

Paul,

There's a Sean Connery line in Hitchcock movie "Marnie":

"I'm just an interested spectator of the passing parade."

:D

When I was a kid, growing up in San Francisco.....we had a grocery store right next to our school. I used to sneak over there and take a shopping cart home. I had to hide it on the side of our front steps so my parents would not see it.

The following day, my little sister and little brother, and me would pile our back packs and stuff into the cart. My sister & brother would hang onto the sides and I would drive the cart by using my shoes as turning brakes on the back wheels.

We had a 1 mile steep ride to school and I'm sure we got those carts up to 25mph or more - it was a blast.

I also remember my mom screaming at me when she discovered wheel shaped, 1" deep grooves in my brand new school shoes - ouch :(

Later on, when I got a little older (7th & 8th grade), we would take the wheels off the carts and make coasters. I built them for the whole neighborhood. I probably owe something to Park & Shop that funded my childhood habit.

The new carts at "Publix" have a two piece hinged plastic seat. I emptied the cart and closed the door on the hatchback. Reached into my pocket for phone...CRAP!..nothing but moths. Opened up the back, the side doors between the fargin' seats.....nada...cruised the parking lot, the aisles twice.....

Pulled my heard out my rectum and checked the cart again. The baby seat had fallen over and covered the phone......kicking myself as I return the cart.....oh yeah half the lot was closed for a slurry treatment so it was 100+ yards each way.

Still irked.....

The new carts at my favorite grocery store have a phone holder build into the handle. My issue is that they also have cup holders.
There's a certain subset of users, probably the same ones who abandon carts, who will just set their empty iced coffee plastic cup on a store shelf, even though there's several garbage cans distributed throughout the store.