What Costco Customers Wish You'd Stop Doing With Your Carts

Costco is always a hopping place, but Costco on a Saturday is nuts. With members scurrying to secure the hottest deals, blocking traffic while they peruse their shopping lists, and screaming children bored with the whole experience, you are left wondering why you chose today to fetch a bag of shrimp chips, a rotisserie chicken, and a hernia-making jug of Tide. Yes, picking the wrong day to shop is a mistake everyone makes at Costco. And it's not just the crowds that are causing your frustrations. It's also the shopping carts.

As a mere inanimate object, it's really not fair to blame the lowly cart for the stupid places where they get parked, even when they wind up resting perpendicularly in a busy aisle. The one who is really at fault is the person pushing it. And, as you wind your way through the throngs, you spot a lengthy list of shopping cart infractions and begin to wonder how on earth these people have managed to navigate the roads to the store in the first place. 

If you are frustrated by less-than-courteous cart users, Redditors are equally appalled by the many cart-pushing faux pas that shoppers regularly commit. And there is one particular offense that has them talking.  

When Redditor u/molybdenum75 posted a request for people to park their carts in wider aisles and walk to what they need, stating, "Too many people bring their carts into small aisles, clogging them up," it sparked a lively conversation. Many users engaged in a series of tongue-in-cheek instructions on how to best annoy their fellow shoppers. One recommended "turning your carts sideways across the aisle, preferably head to head," while another prefers to look for acquaintances that whom they can stand and talk to for 45 minutes. R/Rzrbak enjoys "strolling arm in arm with my friends and family as if we are off to see The Wizard," a move that likely makes them highly popular with those around them. 

Not everyone agreed with the original post, however, questioning the logic of scattering abandoned carts throughout the store. One Redditor confessed that "the idea of people parking their cart anywhere and leaving them unattended gives me the shakes," while others explained that people with children or purses in their carts couldn't simply walk away from them. R/c0demancer offered what was, perhaps, the wisest advice of all by suggesting that people stay with their carts, but act in a mindful and courteous way, moving them when they get in the way of others. This sounds like perfect cart etiquette. After all, both blocked aisles and abandoned carts make shoppers see red.

The next time you find yourself behind a shopping cart, remember that you share the aisles with others. And, no, it's not the yellow brick road.