why do i continue to shop at randalls?!?

this morning i set out to gather up my coupons and make a list for randalls, since i knew i could get free dog treats to take to jacquie's dogs this afternoon. i clipped and printed and assembled my copouns and my list and off i went.

my first frustration was that certain items that i knew were part of the "buy 8, get $4 off" sale were not marked on the shelves. now, this isn't uncommon at the randalls by my house, but it is frustrating, especially since i didn't want to get all the way checked out and find out my $4 didn't come off! my second frustration was that apparently, again not uncommon for this particular store, they're not restocking the one flavor of the chew eez dog treats that are on sale this month. i could only find 2 packages and i needed 4 to use my coupon, so i just got 2 of the other flavor.

on a positive note, while picking up the snyder's pretzels, i found peelie coupons for $2 off fresh beef when you buy 2 snyder's pretzels! yay! to make this peelie coupon even better, i found a package of 2 beef and veggie kabobs reduced for quick sale.

i collected the rest of my items and went to get in line. neither of my two cashier choices seemed likely to be hassle-free, so got in the shorter line. bad choice. immediately after i handed her my stack of coupons, she starts going through them and sorting them out. apparently she was deciding which ones i could and could not use! the first coupon was for a fage yogurt reduced for quick sale. she tells me i can't use a coupon on a reduced item. i politely explain to her that last weekend the store director checked me out and had no problem taking my coupons for reduced items. so we called the director over. in the meantime, the cashier keeps putting more of my coupons in what seems to be a "cannot use" stack! store director comes over, and he tells me i can't use a coupon on a reduced item. wtf????? i explain that he had no such problem taking my coupons last weekend when he was my cashier. he tries to tell me that i'm already getting a good deal, so i explain that the store's reduction of the price doesn't have any effect on getting reimbursed by the manufacturer for the face value of the coupon. he counters by telling me that they don't get reinbursed for the doubling of the coupon. so what! they don't ordinarily. and they've reduced these items that they need to sell fast due to expiration dates, or they'll just have to toss them and write off a loss anyhow. i don't tell him this, and he tells the cashier to go ahead and take my coupon. then we get to the $2 off beef WYB pretzels. cashier tells me i can't use it because i'm using two $1/1 coupons on my two bags of pretzels. i politely explain that the coupons for $1 are off the price of the pretzels and the $2 coupon is off the beef. store director, upon questioning, assures cashier i can use the coupon. whew! now we come to the dog treat coupon. $4/4 treats, any kind by purina. coupon won't scan. no biggie. it didn't scan last weekend and store director just pushed it through. cashier keeps trying to scan it, then finally the director tells her to just enter it manually. she does, but for $1.25 after price checking the treats. hello?!? i question this, and she appears confused. doh! then she takes off another $1.25. okay, better, but still not the $4 face value of the coupon. she takes off another $1.25 then i point out that she's still 25 cents shy of the face value. after some serious concentration, she takes off another quarter. then she has all of my internet printable coupons, which she has set aside. she starts to total out my order, and i ask her about the other coupons. well, she has to check on those. all right. she hasn't even tried to scan them. when she does - surprise! - they all scan with no problems. i've now been at the checkout for roughly fifteen minutes, and i'm hot and cranky. i pay the $3.53 she says i owe and don't even look at my receipt until i get in the car.

i think she scanned one of my $2 OYNO catalinas twice, because i had 2, but 3 seemed to come off. whatever. i'll take it as compensation for the waste of my time because my cashier was a mental midget.

so, in sum, despite the hassle, i paid $3.53 for everything in the photo, plus 4 pkgs dog treats, and got $4 OYNO catalinas for buying the ziploc containers. that's 2 boxes of cereal, 4 pkgs ziploc containers, 4 dog treats, granola bars, granola nut clusters, chex mix, 3 bags pretzels, 1 cake mix, sour cream, yogurt, and beef kabobs for dinner! was it worth my effort. hmmmm. today i don't know. ask me again tomorrow!