Tuesday, September 8, 2015

Confusion in Aisle 7

Could someone please explain to me why two grocery stores - both part of the same chain - can have such completely different stock?

I was looking for some toothpaste this past weekend, and after striking out at Target and Walgreens, I tried our "local" Cub grocery store. They also didn't have what I was looking for. 

So I went to a different Cub, where I didn't find what I was looking for, but did find something really close to it, which I thought maybe had replaced it. When I got it home, though, I realized that it wasn't the same. 

This led me to going to Cub number three after going to a movie tonight. I returned the toothpaste I'd found at Cub #2, and then went down the aisle just for the heck of it. Lo and behold, on the bottom shelf, there were probably a dozen or more boxes of what I had been searching for - the kind which didn't even exist in any of the other stores. 

Now, I know that some stores carry food items specific to their shoppers' demographics. I used to live near a "mainstream" grocery store that had a HUGE selection of international foods because most of its clientele were first-generation immigrants. And when I lived in Baltimore there was a chain grocery store in an Orthodox Jewish neighborhood which carried no pork products. 

But toothpaste? Why would there be such a huge disparity between stores in the types - not even the brands, but just the types - of toothpaste they stock? 

Some things I suspect I will never understand. 

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