I so dislike the crowds. I so dislike having to wait in line to check out! But I do like the fact that I can do 'one stop shopping' to get everything I need(and usually more..lol).

We don't have a 'big box' store in the town where we live, so still shop at our home town stores. Our closest WM is 30 miles away, will shop there if I have to go to that town for other reasons.

I love the big stores. You don't have to go to each and every department if you don't want to and usually I just go to the grocery, drug, and fabric department. However if I need things from the other departments it is much easier for me with bad knees to push that cart than to go out to the car climb in, go to another store and climb out and start the whole process over again. I find it is much easier for me to shop and to walk with a shopping cart. Do others find it easier to walk with a cart?

Sue

I don't like the big box stores either. Just seems odd that you can do your grocery shopping and at the same time buy underwear at the same place. Just doesn't seem right. LOL

Also just hate waiting in line at the checkouts.

I hate our new big walmart, can barely walk from one end to the other.

I, too, like having a big store, that carries almost everything I'm likely to need, in one place, and at good prices. And I actually see the size as a benefit--gives me a good excuse to get a little more exercise.

As to RiteAid, specifically--I will never shop their stores. I've had some very bad experiences with their pharmacists in the past (more than one occasion--they don't seem to have any interest at all in customer satisfaction, IMO), and then when they were expanding in our area, they forced several local pharmacists out of business (I'm not saying they took business away from the little stores so they had to close, I'm saying they pulled some shady deals to steal their stores, then close them down). Guess some will see that as a little hypocritical, in some ways--certainly Wall-mart has put many local businesses out of business, too--but not in the same way.

I avoid shopping at Wal-Mart with a purpose. Their business methods and ethics are not something I want to support with my dollar. I will gladly pay more and drive further to shop at a regular chain or independent.

Here's an example - Just google Vlasic pickles and Wal-Mart and you can read how Wal-Mart nearly put the largest pickle producer in the U.S. out of business. As the world's largest company they have a unique power that they wield with an uncompromising attitude.

Vlasic

OK - that's my soap box speech.

I guess it depends on the time of day and what day you shop. My daughter and I go once a week and usually on Wednesday before noon. We really don't find the long lines and crowds like others have mentioned. We have to drive about 20 miles to shop. Little nearest town only has two groceries and one K Mart. The store's prices are much more than where we like to shop. Lots of other good stores to shop in also when we do our weekly shopping, two pet stores, Goodwill, Aldi's, Deals, Dollar Tree plus the Meijer and Super Walmart just to name a few. Many good places to eat also. They are all on the same highway and not far from each other. The stores are all nice and clean too. Of course we don't go to all of them usually just to Meijer and Walmart. I take a book and if my daughter wishes to go elsewhere, I can read! Yes, it is good exercise walking, which I wouldn't do if at home!

Sue

We just got a new Super Wal-Mart, and I hate it.

I like my grocery store so much better. Some things are cheaper at Wal-Mart, but not everything. Tide was $1 more at WM - and it wasn't on special at the grocery either.

Walmart, do not care for. But here in Michigan we have Meijer's. They have been a "big box" or "one stop shopping" store since I believe the early 60's. (I worked there in the late 60's).
Nice clean stores, great produce section, good service,and you can buy your underwear and household items too! When I got married and moved away from a Meijer's I truly wished I had one near! Nothing worse than dragging 4 kids in and out of several stores! Eventually a Meijer's moved in near us and I was a faithful shopper there. Even my kids liked it. they made what we called "Meijer runs". My DD, who moved to Wisconsin misses Meijer's. Grocery stores there are so different from here (I was surprised). And she doesn't like Walmart!
Another move and I'm back to square one. No Meijer's within 80 miles. Walmart 30 miles. One grocery store 5 miles from house. Lousy produce! But we love living on the lake, so ya make do.
Kathy G in MI

I like my neighborhood Hy-Vee, which is only a couple of years old, and 3 blocks away. It has a floral, pharmacy, and liquor department in it too, but no clothes, or car stuff, or appliances etc. Sometimes Mom and I'll go to Omaha to Costco for stock up items.
Leslie

I try to avoid Wal-Mart as well, and to support our local businesses.

I don't have as much of a problem with walmart type stores as I dislike Lowes and Home Depo more. I prefer a good ole fashioned hardware store. My favorite of those is kinda out of the way, and further, but the service is A+

Moni

I guess I am the odd ball, but I love WalMart. One stop shopping and for the most part, their prices are lower. I like their store brands too.

I avoid our local Walmart but I love the 24 hour Super Walmart 30 minutes away. I go there about twice a month to browse and stock up on pantry items. Their meat while not the best is just as good as most boxed meat at groceries.They also carry things I can't find at the smaller grocers. They have the absolute best raisin bread and cinnamon bread in their baked goods area. The "Great Value" Cottage Cheese is better than the name brands.

I agree with Azalea about Rite-Aid.They used to be good back in the day when they were Payless and Thrifty Drug stores. I don't care for their pricing policies either. Locally I go to Long's,Walgreens or Target.

I love Super Walmarts. One stop shopping and I find them completely different from the crowded narrow aisle regular walmarts.

Walmart puts me in a bad mood so I shop elsewhere.
The kids moan when I announce we have to go to Walmart for something.
LOL

I really resent the way Walmart does business.
They set up shop in a town and make it impossible for small business' to compete then they discontinue everything, such as fabric, yarns and craft items.

Lori

The only reason I like them is that it reduces driving from place to place looking for things. I live in Maine, and supermarkets here tend to be smaller than they were in Mass. I might go to 3 different supermarkets and not find the cleaning products I want. I don't "like" WalMart, but I also don't like looking for a certain stainless steel cleaner for 3 months.

Maybe it's just our area, but there seems to be a new Rite-Aid on every block. They bought up Brooks Pharmacy, where we go. There is a place in NH (Dover maybe?) where there are 2 next to each other. They tore down our favorite Chinese restaurant and put one it. They are putting one in Portsmouth where there used to be a garden center. It's ridiculous.

Another viewpoint about WM. My DH is an OTR trucker, and has delivered to WM way too many times than he cares to talk about.

He says they are one of the rudest companies he has ever had to deal with and refuses WM loads if they are offered to him. Lots of other drivers feel the same.

One stop shopping is a great concept to me. I love it and do my shopping in the wee hours to avoid the crowds and checkout lines. I don't shop at Wal-Mart but do shop Super Kmart. Hope they bring a Super Target to our area. The one near me has some groceries but not a full line. Never heard of Super Rite Aid, but I don't like Rite Aid. All their stores are laid out the same, deliberately making it difficult to get out the door. All I want to do is find the exit.

I just had to add this too. I hate going there and being told "That's a seasonal item" when I'm looking for weather stripping for crying out loud. Well, what season do I look for it then? In the winter it keeps out the cold, and in the summer it keeps out the heat.
Leslie

I love the super Wal-Marts. We have 3 and there's one 10 minutes from us. I go on a week day, early. I made the mistake of going on a Sat. once and that won't happen again. It's one stop shopping and there are some of their products that I prefer--cranberry juice, pimento cheese, some soups, etc,

I love them and wish there were more around. Good exercise and always something new to look at.

Around here, in Wal-Mart country, all the stores are Super Wal-Marts. I like shopping there, but I'm a little displeased that since they've remodeled all of them, the selection has gone way down. I don't mind walking around in them, I can hustle from one side to the other with no problems other than having the aisles blocked by carts or other shoppers, they slow me down! lol I look at it as aerobic exercise.

That said, I love our local grocery stores, too, they're closer and carry a better assortment of items, but with the bridge still closed due to flooding, it's about the same distance to Wal-Mart and since I need to go there for dog food and things that the grocery store doesn't carry, I've been going there more, lately.

I disagree with the statements that Wal-Marts put smaller stores out of business. If that was true, we would have no other stores, and this area of Arkansas is booming and growing like it never has before, we have more new businesses and competition and places to shop than we ever have. Wal-Mart is a great place to buy staples like socks, t-shirts, underwear, but for shoes or clothes that you don't want to see on everyone else, I look elsewhere, like the mall or some of the other stores like Kohl's, Chicos, Bealls, Eddie Bauer, Coldwater Creek, etc. I never buy shoes at WM, they just don't get worn because they always hurt my feet somehow. So shoe stores around here are doing great business, apparently I'm not the only one who thinks that way.

I don't know much about the Vlasic pickle problem, but why would a company agree to supply a store with a product KNOWING they were only going to make a 1-2¢ profit on each jar, and knowing that the bargain bulk price would increase the sales and demands of that bargain jar and lower sales of "regularly priced" pickles? I think Vlasic must have had some management problems.

The main thing I don't like about our super Walmart is the way the store is set up. When I go grocery shopping there I have to walk around the entire store because they put their pet food aisles by the toys and hardware. I think it makes more sense to have pet food by people food!

I agree with what Flamingo said too about there being a bigger selection at other grocery stores. Walmart will have maybe 7 types of Salsa ... the bigger grocery stores might have 20 or more.

I hate Walmart's ground beef too. It stays in that wormy shape even after you cook it. Uck!!

I do like Walmart though and shop there at least twice a month. I just wear comfortable shoes and don't buy the hamburger meat. :-)

I like our old WalMart because I know where things are. Our new Super WalMart is just too big.
Like Leslie, I prefer my local Hy-Vee. The employees are friendly and I know where things are.

Lydia, the only meat type food we buy at WM is their shrimp and frozen chicken breasts. We get all our other meat at the local grocery store, where they cut it themselves. (Right now we're eating buffalo, though, and that didn't come from around here.)

As for the pet dept, since some of WMs have aquariums full of stinky little fishies, I'm happy that they're far away from the people food! But I know what you mean. I usually get sucked from the pet dept straight down to the garden center, I think they have a huge vacuum set up just for that, especially this time of year! lol

I just read about the Vlasic Pickle thing.

This was a poor marketing decision on Vlasic's part. Walmart never held a gun to their head. They never said they'd raise Vlasic's profit margin.They were up front about bringing the pickles to the public at the lowest possible price.Vlasic took the gamble and lost. That's not Walmart's fault.

I have to drive 30 miles for most shopping and I do like making only one stop. So I usually go to WalMart. I enjoy just browsing up and down the aisles.

Lydia, I don't like their ground beef either, for the same wormy shaped reason!

I have a love/hate relationship with Wal-Mart. I grew up in Arkansas and really enjoyed the Wal-Marts there. Now I don't enjoy them so much. I don't care for the supercenters because everything is so limited. I liked them better when they were regular Wal-Marts and didn't carry food. Now, there isn't as much selection and they've cut down on their generics. Wal-Mart is no longer the closet store to me so I've been shopping around. I found if I look around and wait for deals, I can buy better quality elsewhere for the same or lower price. Some other stores are starting to price match. Even if I do go to another store where the prices are higher, I don't spend as much in the long run because I don't make as many impulse buys.

I love Wal Mart!

We didn't have many local stores so I'm very grateful that Wal-Mart came to town. It's limited compared to what most Wal-Marts carry in merchandise but it beats driving to the city every weekend. I still buy the bulk of my groceries in one of the local grocery stores (part of a chain) but Wal-Mart has a few things I can't get elsewhere locally (like Greek yogurt).

We used to have an Ames and the quality of merchandise was really poor. They went out of business way before Wal-Mart came to town. They should have had a lock on local business but people preferred to drive to the city for better merchandise.

So far the only small local businesses that closed were a feed store/gift shop/plant shop place and a craft store that sold a few other miscellaneous items. They both closed up in anticipation of Wal-Mart coming but so far the dollar stores, drug stores and grocery stores are all still there.

Have never been in Wal Mart. They built a super store here a few years ago and both my favorite little local grocery stores /delis/meat depts went belly up. Still pisses me off to no end.
And now they are building another one, 6 miles from this one. This area isn't that big. Isn't that just a little overkill?

*stepping off soapbox now*

I LOVE my Super Walmart....I'm about five mins from it and I'm there nearly everyday...saving lots of money.

patti

Very Interesting! I was speaking with some of my Mother's friends at the Nursing Home last night. We were talking about all the old family business here in our small town of 4,000. There was at one time, 10 Family business here. Now, with Wal-Mart, I think one Western Store survived and a Tractor Company. Chain Business puts little guys out of business.

We have one Family owned Restaurant that does well with traffic off of the Interstate. But, McDonalds, Whataburger, Sonic, Subway, JackntheBox and Dennys stole all the other small Cafe's and quaint places business. That is part of the reason we travel to small towns in our area for a special meal. We don't usually like to eat at a "Chain" business.

Support your local business!

Gayle

I might add, I now shop at Wal-Mart, because all the other business is gone.

Gayle

Hmmm I dislike the Super Walmart in my town immensely. The people that work there are unfriendly, it's dirty, I hate their meat and their produce. That being said, there is another Super Walmart about 10 minutes from where I work that is in an undesirable area but it is such a nice store - friendly people, clean store, not crowded. The only reason I go to the one closest to my house is just that - it's closer than Target or Bel-Air. I will never go there on a Sunday again.

An example, I was standing in line at the check out - there were two check outs in a row - one said 10 items or less, then first one said nothing so I (as well as several people in line) figured that it was ok for more than 10 items. I waited in that line for over 20 minutes and I'm next up and the lady says this is 10 items or less. I was so mad. She could have told me that a little sooner. I had been standing there long enough. It was packed in there so it took me another 20 minutes or more in another line just to check out. I was tempted to tell her what she could do with my groceries and just leave.

Love 'em.

I guess it's a sign that I'm getting older, but I have reached the point of not liking *anything* big -- big cities, big highways, big stores. I visited some villages in England and I love the lifestyle there. In many of them there are no traffic lights even. You walk to the produce shop, the bake shop, the butcher shop, the post office, the barber shop and beauty parlor. If you need to go to a supermarket (one is usually within a few miles) nearby, *then* get in the car.

How many times do we go to the superstore for a loaf of bread and come home with $50 in other stuff? I have found that I throw away so much produce because I buy it at the superstore when I don't actually have a plan to cook it within the next three days.

Sigh -- wish I could live in a small village like those I saw in England.

I like shopping at Wal-Mart because I can get everything I need in one place. Years ago we had a friend that would cut out all the coupons from every store in town and run around all day getting the "bargains".I could never understand why he thought he was saving anything,with gas and time it took to go to all those different places,and that was when gas was a whole lot cheaper!LOL If I didn't shop W/M I would have to drive 50 miles to find another store because that and HEB is all we have.I rarely shop the dollar stores and I buy my clothing online.Everything else is Wal-Mart.
Maybe they do have some "shady" business practices,but find me a store that doesn't (or that you know for a fact doesn't) and I'll be glad to give them all my business! We have 3 home owned pharmacies in town and one just built a brand new building so I don't think even the $4.W/M prescription s have hurt their business. Let's face it,these big stores are a fact of life.They aren't going away and all the boycotting in the world won't make them go away.
As far as long checkout lines are concerned,the HEB is horrible here,not to mention higher prices and less variety of brands.I do buy sirloin steak in the family packs from HEB when it is on special.If we going just to pick up a loaf of bread,we go to HEB.That way I'm not tempted to buy anything I didn't originally go for.I buy my ground beef from a little family grocery/meat market in a little town that doesn't even have a street light,about 5 miles from me.Everything else there is too expensive.

When I finally get to retire, I hope to find a place to live where I can get to know the owner of the stores and shops, as well as all the people who work there. I didn't know how much I'd miss that familiarity until I moved away. Now I live in a suburb of Kansas City ... around here, just about everything is a big store or part of a big chain.

Penney's, Kohl's, Dillards, Macy's, etc ... very few truely individual clothing/shoe stores, and the ones that are here ... are outrageously expensive. Can't afford to buy a $50 t-shirt just to support a local business.

I haven't seen a local drugstore since I left my hometown 21 years ago. Walgreens and CVS are on every-other street corner it seems like. Tractor Supply, Home Depot, Lowe's, Menard's are everywhere. Price Chopper & Hy-Vee grocery stores are the only competitors here.

Wal-Mart, Sam's Club, Costco, Target, Marshall's, Dollar Stores, Barnes & Noble .. the list goes on and on.

Since they're all around me, I'll gladly take advantage of the cost savings they offer.

I often think, years ago, when in Florida, we went into Walmart and I thought I was in heaven...Came back to Pa., and told everyone about this great store...
Well, now I avoid Walmart every chance I get....Sam Walton had the right concept, but I have a feeling he's really turning over and over in his grave.....

I Hate them,i have never made it through one yet,except Costco once or twice.These old knees just can't take them.I'm the kind of shopper with a list.Go in get what you came for and get out.Most of the time i don't even do that,i send DH,as he likes to shop.I on the other hand have never been a shopper and at this stage of life,will never be one.
Kathi

I think a lot of the success of the BIG stores is because of convenience for the shopper.

What we knew as downtown no longer exists. But what fun it was to go there and just window shop, meet friends for lunch at a drug store lunch counter, try on shoes and hats. And actually shop for guality merchandise with clerks who knew the business, whatever it was.

The big stores came in slowly, but we bought into the idea of the big parking lots, one stop shopping, selection and price. Those stores didn't close down Mom and Pop, we did.

This generation has become spoiled. Big parking lots, one stop shopping, price over quality.

Convenience.

Sue

I don't have a strong opinion either way. I live in a suburban area that spread out around an established small town. My choices within 5 miles are virtually limitless, from the mall and club/bulk stores to locally owned drug store and everything in between. I've learned which stores have what I need/want and which ones are overpriced even if they do have it. I don't discriminate by store size, I think I spread my money around pretty well. LOL. Sometimes the small, locally owned store is a better bet, sometimes the superstore is.

If I need to run out b/c I need only: milk, shampoo, cat litter, wrapping paper and a mouth guard I go the superstore to save myself time, one stop. Nowhere else can I get all that and only park the car once. But if I only need the mouth guard, I stop at the locally owned sporting goods store cuz I'm in and out quicker. It might be 10cents more at the small shop, but it's not worth saving 10cents to go to Walmart for 1 thing. For regulary food shopping, I go to a chain grocery with the selections I like, good prices, but no underwear. LOL.

They all have their purpose for me. The small, locally owned shops on "Main Street" have a niche. They do provide some items and a kind of service I can't get at the big stores. Sometimes I need that. There is a locally owned bookstore that I love. There is a dance shop where DD can try on leotards. There is a hockey shop where they know their stuff, I won't go to the chain sports store b/c they do not. (And neither do I, so I need someone who does.) Sometimes, though, I just need convenience.