big chain stores that you kinda hate for some reason

like, do you boycott any of them?

i keep telling myself that i'm NEVER ever going into the rite aid drug store on main street, but i keep going back on my word. blah. they really just bug me cuz before halloween there is a night where the kids go around getting candy from all the stores on main street and the only stores that don't do it are the two chain stores rite aid and fye. actually fye gives out, like, two dollar coupons or something which somehow seems even lamer than not giving out candy. anyway, i'm not rich, but i kept running out of candy the first year we did it - thousands of kids come out for this and the parade and the costume contest - and would have to run to rite aid and get more and i spent almost a hundred bucks there. they are MADE of candy. so lame. to make matters worse, i go back on my word and buy chocolate there yesterday and it was stale! hate you rite aid. you always make a fool of me.

they're all kinda gross in their own way, but i mean, there aren't really many corner mom and pop druggists around to speak of; y'know, no equivalent of a credit union alternative where i can go to bulk up on mallo cups

Target

i don't mind cvs. all corporate culture is not created equal. and that fye music store, blah, don't even get me started...

it's hard to get away from Walmart here

when I enter charges to them in my checkbook register, I shorten the name to "satan"

chain drugstores are the most depressing places

Walmart's evil, but the prices are low, they're local for us and they're at least making an attempt to be more environmentally conscious.

I go to Kroger because they give me coupons, they're closer and I can even get 10¢ off each gallon of gas when I use my card.

But the big chain store I try to stay out of is BestBuy. They get me every once in awhile, but I do what I can to thwart them. I hate them because their lights hurt my eyes, their prices aren't all that great, the employees are clueless, and walking past that security desk at the front of the store where a huge bald guy wearing a headset makes a point to bellow HELLO DERE whenever I walk in to show that I'm on his monitor, fuck 'em all.

I can't wait for Radio Shack to go the way of Montgomery Wards either (501-433-1037, now give me my ac adaptor fucko.)

hate hate hate walmart.

got nostalgic love for radio shack.

I won't go into the local Wh0le F00ds unless I really have to because the management mistreated a disabled relative of mine (as an employee). She is now employed by T4rg3t and they treat her very, very well there.

If I know I have a trip to Tupelo coming up, I'll generally pop in at Kroger and do as much grocery shopping as I can. I don't know if it's the feng shui or what, but Kroger is actually a nice relaxing shopping experience.

i hate on rite aid and walgreens for sure. i also had a lengthy boycott of best buy because their sales dudes drive me nuts, but they are pretty unavoidable and have been better recently.

thing is, if you boycott target or some other store b/c they throw money at anti-whatever politics, and then they end up apologizing and rescinding and so forth, in the end it's just b/c they want your money; it doesn't have anything to do with actually caring about people. it's ridiculously insulting and terribly unsatisfying in the end imo.

i'm not saying that it's pointless to boycott stores, just more expressing frustration with the entire apparatus.

The worst thing about Rite Aid is the way the aisles are arranged so that you can't get from one place to another easily. They make you wander in sort of a zigzag, I guess so you have more of an opportunity to see stuff that you didn't know you wanted to buy. It doesn't stop me from shopping there, but it pissed me off every time that I do.

staples kinda bums me out too. i don't mind the chain supermarkets here too much. we have a big y and a stop & shop. but i almost always go to the local market here and i love it there.

I harbor deep suspicion toward Lumber Liquidators.

gotta give a shout-out to one of my fave chains:

http://www.northrup.org/picture/xl/athol/ocean-state-job-lot.jpg

I hate them all and probably the only one I have to deal with on a regular basis is Target, at the insistence of my wife

chain drugstores are the most depressing places

actually i find chain drugstores to be alright places to be in, whereas most big box stores seem to have perfected soul dampening vibes to out of reach levels

t3sc0. cunts dont pay me enough, refuse to then spend what i do earn on their shit products off shelves that have never been cleaned.

they end up apologizing and rescinding and so forth, in the end it's just b/c they want your money; it doesn't have anything to do with actually caring about people.

I don't expect them to care. The only relationship I have with these merchants is through whether I spend money with them and if they do things like make all the laundry detergent companies shrink their plastic bottles because they feel some pressure, more power to both of us.

My local Longs got converted over to CVS and I hate hate hate it there now. I still go there for prescription pick up & whatnot but ugh...they covered the floor in grey all-weather carpet squares and doubled the height of the shelves and it's just awful there. I mean, Rite Aid Longs & Walgreens can all DIAF but this CVS store is just the worst.

Hate CVS

Yeah, I've been pissed off every time CVS has taken over a smaller drug-store chain (R.I.P. Sav-on. R.I.P. People's Drug), but ultimately I like them better than Walgreens or Rite-Aid.

plus when did every drug store start the whole hard sell WOULD YOU LIKE 2 FOR 1 RAISINETS WITH YOUR PURCHASE DO YOU HAVE A SPECIAL SAVINGS CREDIT COUPON CARD WOULD YOU LIKE ONE ARE YOU SURE WANNA SIGN UP COME ON SIGN UP type shit at the check-out line? they are willing to annoy 9 out of 10 people when they do this. i just want to get the hell out of there. anything that prolongs the experience is annoying to me.

I absolutely cannot stand Costco. I appreciate the reason places like it exist and sometimes it is good to get a few items in bulk, but I'd rather be strapped to a dentist's chair for an hour than be dragged into one of them for fifteen minutes. I never see so much pushing and shoving as I do there, particularly when the herds sniffs out a fresh free sample.

I am pretty anti-Costco, unless you roll in there with a set list and early enough.

See also: Booze on the CHEAP.

the BJs wholesale place here is intimidating and sorta bizarre. like home depot except the 400 pound bags are filled with jalapeno poppers instead of dirt or whatever. and they have a huge bakery there where you can buy 400 cupcakes but its not like a real bakery. i think everything must be thawed out there or something. but, you know, we had a superbowl party and when you need 400 chicken wings in a hurry or a 400 pound bag of pistachios its hard to beat that place.

walmart sex abuse scandal class action lawsuit hits the supreme court:

http://www.businessweek.com/ap/financialnews/D9JUKEC80.htm

the pack circles the wagons:

"Wal-Mart, based in Bentonville, Ark., is appealing a ruling by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco that the class-action lawsuit could go to trial.

Tobacco giant Altria Corp., Bank of America Corp., Dole Food Company Inc., General Electric Co., Intel Corp., Pepsico Inc. and United Parcel Service Inc. are among the companies that also called for high court review of the case."

Try to shop at as few as possible, but def hate walmart the most, although now that best buy has guitar stores I should redirect my commie pinko hate towards a greedy capitalist vibe and hate them more I suppose

walmart sex abuse scandal class action lawsuit hits the supreme court:

um, "sex abuse" and "sex discrimination" are pretty different things

sorry, i grew up reading the new york post. there motto was: always lead with the groin.

Hooters, the restaurant du joir

we went and visited a graveyard where some of my ancient ancestors are buried in holyoke and its right next to a hooters. the irresistible smell of the hot wings must be excruciating for those long dead yankees.

fuck duane reade for opening up across the street from the long-standing mom n pop pharmacy on bedford ave.
i boycott chain bookstores, like yer borders & barnes n noble and shit.
most chain restaurants, unless i'm helpless on the highway or suburbia or something.
obviously no one should be buying gasoline from bp.

chain drugstores are the most depressing places

― (name) in (some place i'm not from) (buzza), Tuesday, December 7, 2010 11:45 AM Bookmark

This. Why is it so?

Exxon is at least as egregious.

xpost

God, I hope Duane Reade never leaks out of New York.

obviously no one should be buying gasoline from bp.

― not everything is a campfire (ian), Tuesday, December 7, 2010 1:28 PM Bookmark

BTW don't agree with this -- (1) BP stations are owned by franchisees, (2) BP gas could just as easily be pumped out of a station with no BP logo on it, (3) It's hard to argue companies like Shell, Exxon, etc. are any better. (xpost)

Although tbf, oil companies make naff all from retail, as stations are franchises, the only way to really hurt them is to stop living or at least stop consuming anything.

xpost

agree that they are all as bad as each other

I have never bought a gallon of Exxon gasoline. The Valdez Disaster happened right around the time I got my license, and I swore them off.

I've probably spent $15-20K on gasoline in my lifetime, but not one drip of it from Exxon. I figure I've cost one oil executive at least two days of a chalet rental for my efforts.

I keep thinking about ending my boycott, but now it's just more about keeping a streak alive than it is about politics. I mean, it's not like Shell doesn't have bones in the closet of its own.

i think we can all agree that everything everywhere is bad. but some are REALLY bad. or depressing. that fye store...sheesh. it reallly does feel like their stock is picked at random by robot monkeys. but sometimes you need, like, ren & stimpy dvds and rap CDs. i never thought any store would ever make me miss the equally dismal strawberrys chain. which is what FYE replaced in the east.

A local chain called Fred Meyers was bought out by Krogers. Several years ago they pounded the shit out of their unionized employees when the contract expired, so I stopped shopping there. I used to shop there all the time.

Yeah, scott pretty OTM with regards to FYE, those stores are miserable to shop in. Although, the last two times I stopped in one I found some really cheap Morbid Angel, Electric Wizard, Neurosis, and Cynic cds... so not totally worthless I guess.

I've probably spent $15-20K on gasoline in my lifetime, but not one drip of it from Exxon. I figure I've cost one oil executive at least two days of a chalet rental for my efforts.

I keep thinking about ending my boycott, but now it's just more about keeping a streak alive than it is about politics. I mean, it's not like Shell doesn't have bones in the closet of its own.

― Pleasant Plains, Tuesday, 7 December 2010 13:41 (1 hour ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

Unfortunately it doesn't really work like that. Gas is a commodity and not buying it from an exxon store doesn't guarantee that you didn't get gas that exxon had some role in extracting, refining or shipping. The very fact that you have demanded gasoline means that exxon have supplied it to you or someone else.

I admit that it's pretty futile, but I've never had a credit card with their name on it, shopped at any merchant with their logo, etc.

Yeah, I've likely had "drips" of Exxon in my tank, but it wasn't for a lack of trying to keep it out.

The energy economy is really hard to opt out of.

i went to a FYE in palm springs once and it was horrible

It's funny, I was trying to look up what gas Kroger uses in its pumps (Marathon Oil, in most cases), and most of the comments were "Oh, thank goodness it wasn't CITGO!"

You have Fred Meyer's AND WinCo – the NW is the best.

ok quick question i've been meaning to ask ilx - are they building more and more drugstores around where you live? i'm trying to figure out if this is a first sign of the coming boomer retirement wave or it's just a local anomaly. big chain drugstores really are awful, so much moreso to me than the big box stores. i either use this local drugstore or this rite-aid down the street that doesn't feel to chainy cuz it's shoehorned into this weird old circular spaceship looking building.

― balls, Tuesday, December 7, 2010 9:03 PM Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

My town has more Walgreens than it has Starbucks, if that tells you something. There's one at the intersection of two streets where if you go east, you'll hit one in a quarter-mile and if you go north, you'll hit one in a mile.

That job lot place sounds like Tuesday Morning here: oriental rugs, Calphalon cookware, birdhouses, stationery...total bonanza for new homebuyers, lemme tell ya.

I've grudgingly had to accept Walmart as a necessary evil since my barbecue-crazy husband discovered that they're the only place that sells Royal Oak charcoal in decent quantities, for cheap...once every few months we go to the local Walmart and load up 2 carts with bags of charcoal, yay wee.
I don't mind the store itself so much, but good lord the staff there tend to be of the human-boot-scrapings variety. And what is with all of the cashiers having odd physical ailments. Arm in a sling, eyepatches...odd.

walgreens has sprouted up like weeds around the bay area over the past 5 years, in SF they're on every block downtown. which is convenient there. they are annoying in Berkeley though because I want a more fully stocked drug store and not a place to buy M&Ms.

walgreens in oakland sells American Spirits for way less than any other store. It also sells cheap DVDs, some of which don't suck.

i love target. the cvs near my house is ridiculous...every time i go there is one old man behind the counter and 50 people in line...they never call for backup.

across the street from my store is an honest to gosh vintage department store. the kind of place where the little old ladies have worked there for 50 years. excellent kitchen department in the basement. but, um, i don't go there much. there has been a walmart threat in greenfield for years now. they have big town meetings. its pretty evenly split in town. the people with limited means want walmart badly. the people with money don't want to have anything to do with it. wilson's would probably be gone for sure if one opened. wilson's IS kind of a relic. i wish they would hire someone to hip it up a bit. the space is amazing.

http://islandportpress.typepad.com/.a/6a00e54f8ef452883301157128da15970b-320wi

http://f33.yahoofs.com/mapann/2197/sr_7128552d78bebf.jpg?lc_____DnGyfcNh3

I guess I don't understand the hate for chain drugstores. If you don't go there, where do you buy your shampoo and face wash and hair product and stuff? I mean in a city you can go to Sephora or a salon or some kind of beauty supply place, but lot of towns don't have those.

Grocery stores have razors and a rly limited selection of, say, your cheap lotions & deodorants & three kinds of crappy toothpaste, but well-stocked drugstores have 27 better brands of each, plus are every girl's introduction to make-up and hair accessories.

xp I loooooooove old-fashioned department stores. Does Wilson's have a lunch counter/cafe? Even better.

I love places like that. There was one near my hometown for years but it closed down recently and tbh it was never really that great. I tried to shop there anyway because I liked the idea of it but the reality was that the merch they stocked was pretty boring or really old fashioned and not in a good way.

Laurel otm. Buying any kind of personal care items at the grocery store is usually more expensive than at a drugstore too.

supermarkets in nj are usually as well stocked if not better than chain drugstores. dunno about girl products though.

I love a nice supermarket. bad supermarkets can fuck right off though

not saying i hate CVS at all, i just hate the lines.

I guess I just hate big box stores that feel dirty or dingy or run down. fill that shit with 10000 fluorescent lights and 50 feet high ceilings and laser doors. if you're going to slowly kill off locally owned shops w/ character by putting up assembly line modern shrines to global capitalism, then go hard or go home imo.

i agree.

i used to love duane reade because they always had the cheapest cigarettes. AND they stocked tareytons. i wonder if they still do. hate store24.

there's nothing worse than having the money to make a nice store and making a soul-deadening pit instead. there oughta be a law...

Making a soul-deadening pit = people don't hang around having a nice time, they go get what they want, pay for it and go away quickly.

how do y'all feel about Aldi?

appropos of this thread i just got a card for the local hardware stores going out of business sale - 96 years! this is what happens when both lowes and home depot pop up in an area that already has a menards and all three proceed to beat the shit out of each other on dumb shit nobody wants. fuckers.

there's a Menards outside of town that is like a giant playhouse

Target's Anti-Gay Political Contributions Backfire

damn didnt know target was on a homo-hatin tip... just damn

Well, shit. That sucks.

Its sad because my local Target is actually pretty pro-gay, sad that it gets all ruined higher up the chain.

appropos of this thread i just got a card for the local hardware stores going out of business sale - 96 years! this is what happens when both lowes and home depot pop up in an area that already has a menards and all three proceed to beat the shit out of each other on dumb shit nobody wants. fuckers.

― O_o-O_0-o_O (jjjusten), Wednesday, December 8, 2010 10:25 AM (2 hours ago) Bookmark

oh god tell me it isn't 7 corners

A local chain called Fred Meyers was bought out by Krogers. Several years ago they pounded the shit out of their unionized employees when the contract expired, so I stopped shopping there. I used to shop there all the time.

― Aimless, Tuesday, December 7, 2010 10:53 AM (9 hours ago) Bookmark

Jesus Christ, Aimless, that was 15 years ago! You know how to hold a grudge!

(shrugs) Once you've stopped something, it is easy to continue on the same path. Once Krogers took it over, there was no reason for local-owner loyalty. Living in a metro area, it's not like I have a paucity of retailers. Also, I try not to live a high-consumption life, so my need to shop at big-box stores is pretty low.

no gbx 7 corners lives on, just a cool little local shop called langulas. they do small engine repair stuff which obv means that the next time my snowblower breaks i guess im just fucked and get to throw it away and buy a new one

Before Krogers bought it, Fred's was owned by Kohlberg Kravis Roberts. It has not been locally owned for almost 40 years.

Consulting wikipedia, I see the KKR buyout was 1982, making it 28 years ago by my math. Time sure flies when you're having fun.

Better yet, JJ -- figure out how to fix your own snowbowler!

Haha! Yeah, I knew that didn't seem right! I had typed in 30 years but then changed it. Duh.

But yeah, for me, it's Walmart. I try to go there once a year to remind myself why I hate it.

xposts to Laurel -- I used to buy a lot of my cosmetics & shampoo at the Long's, but now that it's been converted into a CVS I seriously cannot stand to go in there for anything other than prescription pickup. The difference between Long's & CVS, at least in that particular store is night & day.

There's a Walgreen's up the street from me but that part of town is hella sketchy, I have been there a couple of times and it's like end-times in there...there's a Rite-Aid not far away but the parking lot has maybe 3 spaces and is always full...so really the CVS is the nearest one to me that I can get to conveniently (& safely) in the evening and get a parking space.
These days I get my shampoo at the hair salon and my makeup at Macy's.

Man you guys must have really shitty CVSs. I sort of love mine.

I'll take a photo next time I'm in there. It's awful.

we still have a kmart by us and every time i go in there it has this bizarre overwhelming odor of fresh plastic. its super creepy

the closeout/repackaged returns area is awesome tho, full of mildewed indoor foutains and third rate imitations of popular toys. plus they still have revell modeling kits! which i thought were lost forever when the snyders up the way went splat

i would love local chain pictures on this thread!. or even just pictures of your favorite stores. i will try and take some of the stores around here.

All the people at the CVS near me don't bother to act like they want your business and are all 300 lb 60-year old women.

hey the deeper the quicksand....

in my town there is only CVS no other drugstores so everyone goes there to pick up there scripts...dont get me started on the lines at the pharmacy and the old people complaining. Also, why are all the pharmacists required to stand up at all times. they dont even allow them to sit on a stool.

Chris your username is lol

i think they should be required to lie down the entire time

I like how they're up on that riser, that half-level, moving around and measuring pills. It reminds me of a puppet show.

haha. the place near me has one of those fancy pill machines and FOUR pharmacists.

Target's Anti-Gay Political Contributions Backfire

― shanti ram emmanuel (corey), Wednesday, 8 December 2010 13:42 (1 hour ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

damn didnt know target was on a homo-hatin tip... just damn

― Princess TamTam, Wednesday, 8 December 2010 13:49 (1 hour ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

Well, shit. That sucks.

― ˙❤‿❤˙˙❤‿❤˙ (ENBB), Wednesday, 8 December 2010 13:52 (1 hour ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

Its sad because my local Target is actually pretty pro-gay, sad that it gets all ruined higher up the chain.

― one pretty obvious guy in the obvious (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Wednesday, 8 December 2010 13:53 (1 hour ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

Gah, there's a lot to like about target, it's one of the easier places to get to without a car for household and clothing basics. Plus the new store they are building is designed to enhance rather than blight the neighborhood it's going in (proper high street frontage, pedestrian friendly entrance, hidden parking lot).

Sounds a lot like some Walmarts, except they discriminate against women.

How are Macy's? If they are evil I think I'm down to Brooks Brothers or All Flaverz Clothing for underpants.

Not that I'm a big fan of the downtown pittsburgh Macy's. It's a very sad place mainly because they insist on keeping all 8 floors open with enough stock for 2.

idgi would you shop somewhere where the owner thinks that black people and white people should have different drinking fountains?

See, there's something weird going on there since Target provides same sex health insurance. So it's not as, ahem, black and white as it looks.

I think it's a classic case of trying to play one side off the other and getting pissed on from both angles.

How are Macy's? If they are evil I think I'm down to Brooks Brothers or All Flaverz Clothing for underpants.

Macy's in SF fired Santa so everyone hates them now too

;_;

I love the Macys in downtown SAC. It still has a little bit of the old timeyness on the ground floor with the tiled floor and glass counters