I think supermarket carts should have GPS on them.

18 years ago

I just returned from grocery shopping and I've decided that they should install GPS on the carts. That way when you can't find what you're looking for you could just type it in and the little screen would display the directions.

I can see it now - I'm hunting for the Flora brand of imported pepperoncini, I type it in, the GPS calculates the shortest route, and then shows me the direction. And as I turn down the right aisle a little voice says "You have arrived at your destination. The pepperoncini is on the right on the bottom shelf."

Yes it's a little silly. But I just discovered my supermarket has pepperoncini in three different sections - the obvious is by the jars of pickles, olives and hot peppers. The second was in the ethnic foods aisle with the Cento products. Then today I found an end cap display with Haddon House products and their jar of pepperoncini.

Now I could get really carried away with this - each supermarket could have an online site where you type in your grocery list and hit enter - and voila! it prints out a list arranged by location with perishables at the end.

Or I could be really lazy and just order it all online, drive by the store and stay in the car. While I pay they load it all in the back.

I think I'm getting tired of grocery shopping.

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Comments (16)

petaloid
18 years ago
I like your idea. I think turn signals would also be useful.
dilly_dally
18 years ago
"Or I could be really lazy and just order it all online, drive by the store and stay in the car. While I pay they load it all in the back."

Its actually even easier than that! If you live in a fairly large city there are grocery delivery services where you can order online and they will deliver right to your door. There was one called PeaPod and a few others around.
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heather_on
18 years ago
When I read your title, I thought about all the carts that are taken and dumped elsewhere after people wheel their groceries home in them. They should have a GPS so the stores could easily retrieve them. I am always amazed at the number of people who think nothing of stealing carts from the stores.
jayokie
18 years ago
I agree with the turn signals....but if people won't use them on their cars, they wouldn't in stores either :-/
gadgets
18 years ago
Hmmmm, drive by grocery shopping? I like the idea of just stopping by to pay and have them load 'em up. (I live in a rural area so there's no way for home delivery.) It might be even cheaper that way since I couldn't be tempted to buy what's not on my list.

Shirley
wildchild
18 years ago
Supermarkets are designed to make you walk through them in search of things. They hope to entice you to buy things you didn't come for by making you weave in and out of the aisles. They want you to get lost.

Longs Drugs does have an interactive talking system to help you choose and find medications in their health aisle. Helpful but very annoying since it's voice is activated every time someone walks by.

Technology already exists to prevent carts from leaving a certain area like a parking lot. The wheels lock up when the limits are crossed.
glenda_al
18 years ago
How about a bicycle horn?
Saturdays at WalMart are the pits.
U need a horn and hand signals :o)
Toni S
18 years ago
I'm not kidding, there are stores that do have a version of GPS or used to. I saw it on TV. They have a pad bolted to the cart. You pick out what you want and it tells you the isle.. or something like that.
mcmann
Original Author
17 years ago
Gee toni - I guess that means I can't market that idea and retire wealthy. Back to the drawing board.
Pooh Bear
17 years ago
I have actually used one of those shopping carts before.
It had a little LCD Screen on the handle. You could also
enter items as you shopped and it kept up with the total.
It was at a store somewhere in Atlanta about 17 years ago.

Pooh Bear
Lindsey_CA
17 years ago
"I just returned from grocery shopping and I've decided that they should install GPS on the carts. That way when you can't find what you're looking for you could just type it in and the little screen would display the directions."

One of the grocery stores near us actually has those. I like the adventure of finding things, though... takes me down aisles and past things that I suddenly realize that I just have to buy! :-)

"I thought about all the carts that are taken and dumped elsewhere after people wheel their groceries home in them. They should have a GPS so the stores could easily retrieve them. I am always amazed at the number of people who think nothing of stealing carts from the stores."

Most of the grocery stores here utilize a system that causes the wheels on the carts to lock immediately when they're taken beyond a yellow line that's painted around the perimeter of the parking lot. The first time I saw it in action, I thought the guy had a cart with a bad wheel! Try as he might, he could not get the thing to move forward past a certain point... Even if you pick the cart up and carry it over the line, it won't roll at all.
FlamingO in AR
17 years ago
I think it would be great, especially in stores that are always being rearranged. They just re-did our Wal Mart AGAIN, and everything, everything is in a different place. I must have walked for 30 minutes the other day just to get 5 items.
Happy_Go_Lucky_Gayle
17 years ago
I'd love to have a GPS on a grocery cart. I hate shopping.

Gayle
User
17 years ago
I think rearranging things is Wal-Marts way of marketing. The more you search, the more you buy.

I think GPS would be nice sometimes, but customer service would be even better. When I worked summers in a grocery store, we were expected to know where things were. It wasn't hard, you just take a different route to the breakroom each day and pretty soon you know where everything is.
jannie
17 years ago
I've been shopping in the same store for 27 years, but I still can't find some things. Where are the marches? The bug spray? I don't know if a GPS would work. A store should have someone do a complete inventory, then put the results on a computer program, a spreadsheet in alphabetical order.
alisande
17 years ago
Or . . . we could just go back to the general store. Think Little House on the Prairie. Our bolts of calico would be in plain sight, along with our 25 lb. bags of flour and sugar. And instead of fumbling in our purses for a credit card, we could just say, "Put it on our account, please, Mr. Dwindle."

The hard part would be persuading the horse to pull all our stuff home.

I think supermarket carts should have GPS on them.

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petaloid

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I think supermarket carts should have GPS on them.

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