Grocery Shopping Tips

You probably won't find a customer-visible clock in your neighborhood supermarket.  The store wants you to forget about the passage of time and stay there forever, browsing the shelves and soaking up desires for more foods.  But beyond grocery-shopping, supermarkets are offering additional inducements for you to stay put.  Let's check out the specifics of what's fun and instructional in many stores.  Then, let's focus upon the one place at which the store wants to speed up your departure--the check-out counter.  A high-tech device now being tested can do this.

• Don’t buy items near or past the “use by” or “sell by” date. Look on the back of the shelf or further down in the bin to find an item with a later date. (Retailers regularly rotate stock to sell the oldest food first.)
• When you shop in a hurry and don’t check package dates, save your receipt. Check the dates at home; return anything that’s expired.
• If the packaged meat, poultry, or fish is about to expire, speak up. Ask the butcher if there’s anything fresher in the back.