Well, grocery delivery has turned out to be surpisingly convenient

[conuly]

and there are some things I can order that I can't easily get without a long bus trip - blintzes, Ben and Jerry's ice cream*, butter at a decent price** - but I'll be delighted when I feel secure going to the store myself again. The tips are really cutting into the grocery budget, and I don't begrudge the delivery guys their tips - they earn them! - but....

Also, it was impossible to even get a slot for ages, and I've been buying two weeks at a time, but that's died down and I think I should be able to start buying for one week at a time again pretty soon, especially if I'm buying in person (no tips!), and that'll clear up a lot of fridge space.

Now, NYC is talking about starting to reopen June 8th. Give it two weeks to see if cases spike, that puts us now at the end of June so I think I won't make any changes at all until the third Monday after July 4th. If there isn't a spike at the end of a partially reopened holiday weekend then we should be pretty safe. Safe to go grocery shopping, anyway, in the mornings when it's not too crowded and I'm all masked up.

Still not encouraging my mother to go out and about even a little. Hahahaha no.


* I know, it's a travesty.

** All I ask is that they don't gouge!

Comments

[lilysea]

The tips are really cutting into the grocery budget, and I don't begrudge the delivery guys their tips - they earn them! - but....

Australian here: do you tip a percentage of the grocery order, or a flat fee, or... ?

Honestly curious.



[When I get a delivery from a supermarket here in Australia I pay a delivery fee to the supermarket, between $15 Australian, $12, $9, $6, $3 and $0 Australian, depending on how much I order - the more $$$ of groceries you order, the lower the delivery fee. Regardless of what delivery fee I pay, the supermarket pay a flat wage to the driver [around Australian $40,000 - $59,000 per year]. No tips expected.]

[conuly]

I've been sort of in between a percentage and a flat fee. I'm not entirely sure what's appropriate here.

There is also a delivery fee. I'm not sure if Peapod is gig work or if the workers get a steady wage or if it's in between (like, they get a wage but have to pay for gas and mileage out of pocket, common with pizza delivery) but I am certain they are not paid what they deserve, even before the pandemic. I'm not actually thrilled with doing delivery... but I feel the net social cost of having one worker go to the store for multiple people rather than multiple people go to the store evens out.

[lilysea]

Oh, I didn't realise your deliveries were by a third party service! I thought the drivers were employed directly by the supermarket! [Here if someone gets groceries home delivered the drivers are almost always full-time supermarket employees]

but I am certain they are not paid what they deserve, even before the pandemic.

Totally not arguing with that, just curious how things work in different countries.

[conuly]

Having the groceries delivered by full-time employees hired by the store would be the smart way to do things, especially if they were able to take the goods directly instead of having to compete with in-store shoppers and some old-school stores may still work like that. Actually, for all I know Peapod might really be like that. If I do enough research to make an informed choice, I'm worried that my informed choice will be that none of it is good, and... last time I was at the supermarket I screamed at some woman. I posted about it. I don't think I'm really in a state where I should be interacting with hordes of people just yet.

[lilysea]

Having the groceries delivered by full-time employees hired by the store would be the smart way to do things, especially if they were able to take the goods directly instead of having to compete with in-store shoppers and some old-school stores may still work like that.

When I order from Woolworths, supermarket staff [not drivers] who would otherwise already be in the supermarket staffing cash registers; helping customers in the aisles; or restocking shelves
get diverted to pulling groceries off the aisles.

The driver doesn't have any contact with shoppers, either in the supermarket or at the delivery end - they're very clear that they don't want the driver to have any face to face contact when he delivers the groceries - they just leave them on your front doormat and send you a text message that they've arrived.

During the height of things in Australia, some Woolworths supermarket branches became delivery-only stores not open to the public - I am not sure if they are still doing that.

[redbird]

Peapod is connected to Stop and Shop (a specific supermarket chain). A lot of other groceries have connections to Instacart (which is gig work). And both of those will (if there are slots available) deliver to my house.

[redbird]

I know there's a union contract for at least some Peapod employees, but my quick googling didn't tell me whether that covers delivery people as well as the "pickers" who find your groceries for you. What I found was on the union's website, and it didn't say anything about location, just "local 400."

[conuly]

Well, if I give a tip, which person gets the tip?

[redbird]

I don't know, sorry.