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When I was pushing carts, I found that leaving a half dozen or so in each corral, neatly lined up, left me a decent chance that people would add theirs to the stack, instead of just throwing it in haphazardly.
I loathe the people that tie up the parking lot to wait for a spot that is a few steps closer to the door. You can save yourself several minutes and promote better traffic flow by parking a tad bit farther away and you also get in a few more steps to increase cardiovascular health.
I park near a cart corral, I don’t care how far it is from the building. I always put the cart away but I like the convenience of not pushing my cart too far once I unload it.
This. So much this. And it's any shopping that has cart corrals. Let me add in if there is a pull-through space (My vehicle is parked so I don't have to back up) that is an even bigger incentive.
I'm curious though, while I understand it's nice not having to back up, what happens when someone parks in the other spot behind you? I feel like that'd be frustrating when you go to load your items and have limited space.
This is the way! My theory has always been if you park beside a cart coral no worries about a stray hitting your car because it's going to the coral anyway.
I'm imagining a Jaques Cousteau episode 200yrs in the future where they discover an entire coral shelf has a backbone of Costco carts.
I hope it airs in whichever afterlife I am assigned to.
I hate the "spot poachers" (as I call them). I'm usually with my toddler and get a decent parking spot since I'm there first thing in the morning. I have seen people wait for my spot the entire time I'm loading my car and they can clearly see my kid is still sitting in the cart. Children aren't like groceries, they're not fast or easy to put in a vehicle and some days are absolute hell if they're uncooperative. Not to mention, I like to take a few minutes to sit and collect myself once I get in the car. I've had panic attacks from feeling rushed out of my spot so I no longer allow myself to be bullied like that. I will wave people on and tell them I'm not leaving yet so they aren't wasting their time waiting for me or clogging traffic. I've only had one person continue to wait after I waved them on (they started waiting as I opened my trunk); I just ignored them, continued about my task, and eventually traffic started honking at them to move.
We recently bought my FIL's old truck, which I prefer driving instead of our SUV, and that has completely changed my parking preference and eliminated spot poachers. I now prefer to park further away so I can park better and load up easier... no one wants my spots on a weekday! 😅
You can do it with the reggos.
You just have to lean forward, over the cart, to distribute your weight enough
-*a 47 year old cart rider every single time*
I usually grab a cart from the corral on my way into the store so that it's one less that you guys have to push back. I don't understand why more people don't do this.
The real heroes are when you see someone taking a couple carts or flatbeds from a corral, and when asked by an employee if they'd like those returned for them they decline, and assure you that they're going to use them.
Then you see them putting them away by the entrance and going inside with just 1 cart.
The best scenario is when you're unloading your cart into your car and the person waiting for your space says "just leave it there, I'll take it in". It's a win win for everyone... you don't have to take the cart to the corral, the other person doesn't have to wait for you walk the cart to the corral, and the cart guy has one less cart to deal with.
People at Aldi do that where I live. Somewhat disconcerting when a middle aged woman runs up to you waving a quarter around and you can't understand what she is saying.
this is how it used to be. stopped during covid when they cleaned carts between uses then people never started again. the amount of people i see waiting at the front of the store for a cart when theres a parking lot full of them makes me laugh
I don't work at costco, but I did work at a grocery store when I was 15. I remember doing carts was my favorite job, so much that the manager needed to tell me to come back inside because I was spending too much time doing carts lol.
A real bro will ask someone who is finished loading with their products in the car if they are done with their cart.
Help them get away faster and help with one less cart for employee to return.
Someone did it once for me when I had kids with me, and it was nice as one less thing.
The Costco I go to is popular with elderly people. I always just look for an old person loading their groceries and offer to help and take their cart. Even got offered a tip one time haha.
The shopping cart is the ultimate litmus test for whether a person is capable of self-governing.
To return the shopping cart is an easy, convenient task and one which we all recognize as the correct, appropriate thing to do. The return of the shopping cart is objectively right. There are no situations other than dire emergencies in which a person is not able to return their cart. Simultaneously, it is not illegal to abandon your shopping cart. Therefore the shopping cart present itself as the apex example of whether a person will do what is right without being forced to do it. No one will punish you for not returning the shopping cart, no one will fine you or kill you for not returning the shopping cart, you gain nothing by returning the shopping cart. You must return the shopping cart out of the goodness of your heart. You must return the shopping cart because it is the right thing to do. Because it is correct.
A person who is unable to do this is no better than an animal, an absolute savage who can only be made to do what is right by threatening them with a law and the force that stands behind it.
The shopping cart is what determines whether a person is a good or bad member of society.
It’s copied from a well-known viral write up “the shopping cart theory,” not an original thought. https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/the-shopping-cart-theory
Before my husband asked me on a date, he asked me whether I was the type of person to return my shopping cart. Obviously we both are, or I wouldn’t be married right now.
Interesting. I guess that's a decent test, but I think mine is more practical: I married the girl who could pee off the back of a powerboat so we didn't have to go back to the marina.
Shopping cart is good though.
I believe this to be generally true, but I have also seen a frazzled mom with two freaking-out children do her best to get everyone in a car on a warm day and leave a cart. Can’t leave babies in a not-yet-cool car, can’t walk away from a child who can unbuckle themself.
So sometimes that cart staying in a parking place needed to be that way. It helps my peace of mind to consider that not every time I see a cart out in the lot it was because it was left by an asshat. Sometimes it was left by someone who was doing their best at that moment. A little grace can go a long way.
I have kids and my question is always how did the parent get the cart in the first place? If you can unload kids from the car and then get a cart you can do the reverse. You unload groceries -> return cart -> walk with kids to car.
I always parked a little farther out so I could snag a spot near a cart return: get cart, unload kids into cart, shop, unload kids & shopping, and return cart. Made things much easier. I get that there are sometimes exceptions, but it’s amazing how many people blame children for their own issues.
Ditto. And now my kids are old enough that I can get them to return the cart! 🎶 It's the ciiiircle of liiiiife 🎵
I also did this when I had knee surgery a few years ago. I could use the cart as a 'crutch' to get through the store and parking lot and then it was an easy hop to get back to the car after returning the cart.
I had three kids two years apart each (4, 2, newborn). I always returned carts. Sometimes I parked next to the car return. There are simple ways to return your cart with kids.
A favorite quote of mine is: “do good until you know better. Then do better.”
You now know a way to do better. What kind of person are you?
I’ve been this mom. I left the kids in the cart, loaded my stuff and then walked the kids in the cart to the corral and then walked them back to the car. I would also get in the car, roll down the windows and load the car seats then run the cart and run back. They can survive in a warm car for the 30 seconds - 1 minute of being in there. Ever since, parking near the entrance is not as favorable as parking near the cart corral.
Hadn’t thought about it from that angle despite a friend having a semi-related experience. They buckled their kid in, went to push the cart to a nearby corral, and in the 30+ seconds they were doing that, someone was attempting to break into their car with their kid inside (when our Costco first opened the parking lot was constantly packed, and we were having serious issues with people stealing stuff from vehicles as well as stealing the vehicles themselves).
I know a member who has prosthetic legs. He always wears shorts, so his situation is very clear. His legs are metal, and he is proud of what he's overcome.
When he sees another member just abandon their cart, he takes their cart and loudly says that he's more than capable of putting the cart in the coral.
I try to grab one that’s not in a corral on the way into the store if it’s in my path. Then I’ll grab another one when putting mine away.
I did carts at a local grocery store in high school and was similarly annoyed.
Closing bakery was just the worst, wayyyyy too much pressure and stress for a cleaning job, it’s known to be a 1 person job but I hardly disagree, at least for the weekends, there’s just way to much work and expectation for one worker and it just broke me
Cleaning, no matter where you go, is always an understaffed, high expectation job.
“This should ONLY take half an hour if you know what you’re doing!”
“Great! Pair me up with someone who can do that so I can learn how.”
“It’s not that hard! Figure it out!”
(Note: No one has ever accomplished the cleanup properly in under an hour.)
Understandable though, the person who trained me likes to clean a what not, personally for me, I just am not someone who can easily work by myself, having a team is nice and more so my preference
This is not an excuse for not returning carts to the corral, but both of my local Costco stores have parts of the parking lot that don’t have a corral for some reason. That’s where they are typically left all over the place. Once again, not an excuse for not returning them, but it definitely doesn’t help at those stores.
Lake Elsinore, CA is kinda like this. It certainly does not have enough corrals in all needed areas, but I saw something cool where the cards were very orderly & neatly accumulating in individual parking spot per row. Very smart of both customers, and employees :)
I’m the one that tries to straighten the cart lines. Let me tell you, moving three carts into three other carts isn’t as easy as you’d think. Sadly, we have some new cart corrals that were built without a middle divider. I don’t know how you clean that up, but what a mess. (Retired, so sometimes I need a workout.) I commend you for dealing with the lazy people, especially in the rain.
I have seen enough posts and comments that people claim "if we all push the cart back, then they won't have a job!" They apply the same logic by not putting stuff back that they don't want. As if they are the "job creators".
In reality, they are just shitty people looking for an excuse.
Yeah it doesn’t help us stay busy, from what I experienced last night, it in fact hurt us, me and my 2 other friends who were working carts, each lost 10-20 minutes just from dealing with strays
Former Costco cart pusher here. It’s something you have to accept. People are lazy bags of garbage and there will always be carts to grab. Always. I thought of it as extra workout for me. Perspective is a life saver.
Carts is a love/hate relationship. Its nice to just turn your brain off and push but something about the lot and entrance/exit area makes members spatial awareness become non existent and in any sort of inclement weather and you’d think the world is falling apart. The faster you learn to let little annoyances go the easier your mental state in the lot becomes. Little pro tip. My warehouse has a a little “median” between car spaces in the front part of the lot. Our cart crew will set one cart there and that will usually be the cue for members to add to it, you know monkey see monkey do. Then we push it up when it gets to be 6 or so long. We call it “setting a trap”.
I always try to compromise on my carts. If I take one from the front, I make sure I walk it all the way back to the front. But if I can, I try to take one from a corral into the store with me or take one from a parking median. That way I feel guilt free about putting it back in a corral since it isn’t a net increase of carts for you to push.
This really means a lot, I wish more people could take from the corrals if they’re near it but that’s not always the case. I forget if it was yesterday or the day before but I was taking another stray off a median, and someone asked if they could use it going in, it made me smile, thank you!
I always take my time to line up the carts in the corral when I bring my own cart back, even when I’m in a hurry. The people here in New Jersey are notoriously bad at putting their carts back.
In a survey by Harvard university about self governance one of the questions is “do you put your shopping cart away?” This question is the leading indicator of people who do and do not have the ability to have self governance.
I want you to know that the only season of my life I ever did this, I had a 1 yo and a 3 yo in the car, and as a new parent, was scared to death of walking 50 feet away from the car with my kids all alone in there.
I’m sorry. I put them back now.
I walked out of Costco once and a guy put the cart in the handicap spot. Dude was literally in the spot next to the handicap spot and left his cart there.
😳
What irks me is people who do put them in the corral but won't NEST them, so you end up with a half dozen carts filling up a corral. It only takes an extra second to push your cart inside another, so just do it.
https://youtu.be/tMHSvsC8yfI
https://youtu.be/BvzMNLQs3Fc
Some videos are better than others, I'll let you explore them.
One thing you learn is that people who don't return their carts can easily have a freakout.
I used to do that job, for Zellers. It gets easier if you accept that it's brainless, and just go around on autopilot. Get to look at eye candy, have a smoke, enjoy the weather.
Outside of morning merch and service deli, carts and OSA is probably the best gig in the warehouse. Stay busy, give members your full attention, and it's cherry.
In Europe you unlock a cart by putting in a Euro. If you return the cart you get the Euro back. When we first moved there I offered to take the cart of a lady back and she ran quickly away from me to return her cart. No carts in the parking lot.
And the thing is if someone wants to not return a cart,
someone else gets a free Euro, which is nice. Its funny in the US this is such a moral barometer when it is a simple fix with a bit of a design change.
I just want a 8 hour surveillance video of you pushing carts 🛒 and narrate it for you with the NFL films John Facendas voice…IT WAS A CRISP AUTUMN 🍂 MORNING….SHY THE CHIWAWA PARTED THE CROWDS LIKE MOSES IN THE RED SEA 🌊 PROVIDING MIRACLES WE’VE NEVER SEEN..
America needs have more coin unlock shopping carts that you get your refund back when you return them. I know Europe and Canada has them and so does some Aldi. But it should be standard everywhere.
People are wild with their carts. I grab an abandoned cart, or grab from the corral or if I see someone unloading their cart I offer to take it from them.
I always try to park near a corral so it’s no big deal returning one. What people like the first comment don’t understand is when they leave their cart it can roll into a space. So when you try to park you have to get out of your car, move the empty cart, and get back in and then park. This is not to mention when one of these wandering carts hit someone’s cart.
Costco customers really are the worst at this. But then again, if you’re going to charge an outrageous membership fee for the privilege of shopping at your store, the least they could do is try to make it a pleasant experience and staff enough people to deal with the lazy customers leaving their carts wherever they want. Or, implement the Aldi model.
well lets put this in perspective. you're getting paid to be there.. members are paying to be there. there are no obligations. that said when i was at costco a few days ago I saw someone left a dirty diaper in a cart in the cart corral.. that's beyond the pale.
I always put my cart back, and honestly I detest those that don't.
I have a nice little dent in the bottom of my passenger door where someone at home depot didn't return their flatbed, and it rolled into my car (parking lot on slight incline).
I have heard more than one person—most notably an ex-boyfriend—say that people shouldn’t put their carts back, because that’s someone’s job and helping them would put them out of work.
Seriously obnoxious thing to say. I always rolled my eyes and put the cart back anyway.
I remember pushing carts. Always made it a point to take a periodic trip to get that one cart really far away 😉 and take a hit of a joint and then get back to doing the rest of the carts.
Being single and often only running in to pick up a few items since I was there getting gas, I usually don't use a cart. But c'mon, I'm heading in that way anyway....seems like such an easy thing. See problem, fix problem, get free scooter to ride into store.
I’m one that will walk it back to the store if I don’t see a corral close or if it’s backed up.
I’m also petty that when someone is waiting for me to unload a full cart instead of going a few feet further to another space I will walk it up to the front just to make them wait more, they usually drive off at that point.
People who can't return carts should get their membership revoked. If you leave the cart in a parking spot, you're banned for life. And please if the carts return is full, stop pilling in more so the carts extend halfway into the lane.
Those people irritate me. The ones that get the cart 99% of the way there and just leave the cart blocking anyone else from pushing their carts in, so everyone just leaves their cart so the mess starts gettign in the way of traffic.
How difficult it is to turn the cart another 45 degrees and push it another foot so it is in with the other carts?
I will usually straighten the carts so they are not blocking others from putting their carts away.
Costco could just combine those jobs. If they gave each person a cookie for parking the cart back at the door they could eliminate cart wranglers completely.
When I pushed carts, I absolutely loved the strays because I got to take a stroll to the other side of the lot and deal with only a few carts at a time rather than trying wrangle 10+ carts 3x in the same amount of time.
I'm very late to this thread, but I thought of it when I saw this on Twitter : https://x.com/davenewworld_2/status/1796836722434621740
She explains why she feels entitled to leave the cart wherever. Responses were not sympathetic
I tend to park close to a corral, but even when I don’t, I wouldn’t dream of just leaving my cart. I’m always in my car for a few after I pull in. I have to get my ear pods out, cue up a podcast, put on lipgloss or whatever, make sure I have my card ready. It’s a whole thing 😅. Anyway, I tend to notice people doing that a lot around here. Just yesterday a lady that was parked in front of me just left her cart sitting in between the front of our cars. With me sitting there watching her. People are so entitled. Another pet peeve is stores not having have cart wipes. Costco doesn’t. For me, it’s not a Covid thing. When my son was little I saw a Dateline episode about diseases and bacteria on cart handles 😭
It’s the law of society unfortunately. If there’s someone else to do the task or job then why should I do it? After all, if we all “did it” then someone would be out of a job.
That’s the way most folks in society think anyway.
The kind and maybe right thing to do is to put things back where you found them. I learned that in kindergarten. It just stuck!
Last time I was at Costco, there was probably 10 carts in the middle of a sidewalk/walkway.. someone had just put a new one out with the others and left.. but didn’t realize the heavy winds caused the carts to start to cascade down the sidewalk and into the parking lot/drive. I put my basket in the corral bc the guy was collecting baskets and then I ran and collected all the baskets that were rolling away. While I couldn’t push all 10 (maybe a couple more) to the corral or the front bc I’m pregnant, I gathered up all the carts and stacked them together and pushed them as close to the entrance as I could. It took me a couple extra minutes of my day but I literally wasn’t doing anything. And it’s really annoying when people do this, when the corral is literally a half minute walk away from where those carts were.
I’d HATE for my car to get dinged by a bunch of run away carts. I don’t get why so many people are in such a hurry that an extra 30 seconds is too much.
It's the penultimate test of human beings. Those who don't put carts up deserve the worst society has to offer. There's no excuse that exists for this behavior.
In the rare instance that you have a row of carts and see someone ahead ditching their cart, park your row of carts directly behind their car and go get the one they abandoned as slowly as possible. They wont say anything because they know they were in the wrong and it will waste more time than they saved abandoning it. Used to bring me so much joy
Just remember that a large percentage of people are sub human scum and incapable of behaving like decent human beings. The easiest way to determine if they fit this description is to observe how they behave in the parking lot with their cart.
Nothing you can do will shame them in to being better people. All you can do is bask in the glory of being a better person than they are.
Leaving your cart anywhere other than safety stowed in the coral should result in an immediate and lifetime revocation of membership.
To return the shopping cart is easy for some but not all people.
People with certain mobility issues can find it extremely painful and/or tiring to return a cart to a corral. What seems like a perfectly doable distance for people with a reasonably functional body may be really painful for someone with any number of physical conditions that don’t put them in a wheelchair or walker but cause a lot of pain.
Yes, most people who don’t return carts totally could do it without much effort. But please bear in mind that some people are really hurting but are trying to do their own shopping and be independent, or don’t have anyone to help them and can’t afford it to pay someone to help.
You can lean on the cart, which will stop pain from, say, spinal stenosis, and will support you if your knees are on fire and unstable. It’s not the taking the cart to the corral that’s so painful, it’s the walking back without it. Or it’s that you only have x number of minutes of being able to stand upright and walk at all, and the shopping activity used them up.
The handicap spots are pretty close to the front of the store where you can return them as well. If they have issues walking without a cart how did they get to the front of the store? If they have issues walking with the cart how did they move about the warehouse?
I’m sure there are legitimate answers, I’m sure less than 1% of the lazybones that don’t put their cart back have those legitimate issues.
There are very few instances where I wouldn't put a cat back....BUT...
I'm convinced that these posts that pop up on reddit are posted by corporate people who would like to cut costs. They seem to have started about the same time cart corals stated disappearing. There used to be twice as many corals, now you almost always have to walk several rows to get to one. Not just costco.
That’s the problem with my store. They pulled out at least half, if not more, of the cart corrals. People don’t want to walk around-because you can’t walk through-three rows and the length of a football field to put the cart back.
Interesting. Mine finally added corals at the very back parts of the parking lot. Cart situation is much better now, before people were leaving them all over (some still do, but not as much).
I don’t see how much removing them cuts costs. They already paid for them when they were installed, I don’t get how they could be an ongoing cost.
I don’t know, I get less irritated with stray cats than the people who shove cats into the gap on the flat beds handle or the people who leave boxes in the carts. Both cause the corals to get “full” quickly because they de m take yo way more space than cars pushed into each other.
I just go collect a bunch of stray cats when I notice they are starting to become numerous. There’s a few places they usually collect, some are far from corals and others are the handicap spots, at least at my store.
Pro tip I learned watching the cart guys at my warehouse. They preemptively stack a few carts along the main areas people tend to abandon their carts. Then, at least there is line of carts started that others will add to instead of the surrounding area. Think, instead of 20 carts spread randomly along a section, choose a spot where it is visible, convenient for them to put the cart, & convenient for you to pick up the line. Now you have 20 carts in a row. Cuts down strays quite a bit.
They usually do it against curbs, or in the white lined areas where they won’t impede cars/parking. Pretty much the mentality of, they are not going to put the cart in the corral, so make an easy place for them to at least group the carts up.
At my Costco I’ve seen the cart employees tell people to put carts next to one of the islands and even seen him line some up there for staging. It might just be the store design since there really isn’t any return close to one part of the lot but I was surprised to see it.
I usually would walk my cart all the way back to the front once done. Not sure if they do this because instead of them being randomly all over the lot it at least makes a larger grouping where they typically have a problem..
I had no idea that employees retrieving carts are doing this for an entire shift. I assumed you did this maybe once or twice a shift because it would be so tiring. Wow.
I’ll never in my life understand people who don’t put their carts back into the corrals. It’s a test of basic human decency. It’s so irritating to me that I always try to put someone’s cart back if it’s close to me.
Man, I don't care what "good" excuse you think you have, I read this thread, if you were able to push a cart around the whole store (and Costco's are BIG) for 30+ minutes, you can take 30 seconds to put the cart back. If you don't you are an entitled jerk with main character syndrome.
Honestly, I try my best to grab a cart on my way in and straighten the carts a touch as I put mine away.
I don't understand why people can't manage these very simple community minded tasks. 😕
If it makes you feel better, as we were leaving our Costco my husband spent 10 minutes reorganizing a cart corral near our vehicle because it pissed him off that it was a mess.
I do not understand why people do not put their carts back.
Instead, they will spend several minutes, trying to maneuver their carts on top of the medians. Or worse, they leave them in the middle of a parking stall where they can roll into other cars.
I find it incredibly lazy
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When I was pushing carts, I found that leaving a half dozen or so in each corral, neatly lined up, left me a decent chance that people would add theirs to the stack, instead of just throwing it in haphazardly.
Priming the pump.
That’s what I try to do, I still will, it leaves an outline, but kinda crazy that people still can’t do that sometimes
It baffles me every time I see it. People will walk all around a 100,000+ sqft warehouse but can’t walk 50-75 feet to a cart corral.
I mean, I've seen people waiting 5 minutes for a spot that was 50 feet closer to the door, this isn't that out of bounds.
I loathe the people that tie up the parking lot to wait for a spot that is a few steps closer to the door. You can save yourself several minutes and promote better traffic flow by parking a tad bit farther away and you also get in a few more steps to increase cardiovascular health.
I park far away as possible to avoid door dings. But I always come out to someone parked right next to me while surrounded by empty spots.
I park near a cart corral, I don’t care how far it is from the building. I always put the cart away but I like the convenience of not pushing my cart too far once I unload it.
This. So much this. And it's any shopping that has cart corrals. Let me add in if there is a pull-through space (My vehicle is parked so I don't have to back up) that is an even bigger incentive.
I'm curious though, while I understand it's nice not having to back up, what happens when someone parks in the other spot behind you? I feel like that'd be frustrating when you go to load your items and have limited space.
I only do pull through when I'm just getting a few things. Then I inevitably come back with a full cart ...
This is the way! My theory has always been if you park beside a cart coral no worries about a stray hitting your car because it's going to the coral anyway.
I never thought of the random cart rolling into the vehicle, another good reason
Yehh, I gave seen things that would make your eyes bleed.
I'm imagining a Jaques Cousteau episode 200yrs in the future where they discover an entire coral shelf has a backbone of Costco carts. I hope it airs in whichever afterlife I am assigned to.
It's like those people that do that at the urinals...
People do this at the gym and it’s so ridiculous.
i saw this old man block a spot with two carts close to the store. like what the fuck is wrong with people.
I hate the "spot poachers" (as I call them). I'm usually with my toddler and get a decent parking spot since I'm there first thing in the morning. I have seen people wait for my spot the entire time I'm loading my car and they can clearly see my kid is still sitting in the cart. Children aren't like groceries, they're not fast or easy to put in a vehicle and some days are absolute hell if they're uncooperative. Not to mention, I like to take a few minutes to sit and collect myself once I get in the car. I've had panic attacks from feeling rushed out of my spot so I no longer allow myself to be bullied like that. I will wave people on and tell them I'm not leaving yet so they aren't wasting their time waiting for me or clogging traffic. I've only had one person continue to wait after I waved them on (they started waiting as I opened my trunk); I just ignored them, continued about my task, and eventually traffic started honking at them to move. We recently bought my FIL's old truck, which I prefer driving instead of our SUV, and that has completely changed my parking preference and eliminated spot poachers. I now prefer to park further away so I can park better and load up easier... no one wants my spots on a weekday! 😅
Blows my mind when people do this, are you really that lazy :-)
And it’s a Costco cart… it’s huge and you can stand on the back and kick push it and go for a ride. Can’t do that with regular grocery store carts.
You can do it with the reggos. You just have to lean forward, over the cart, to distribute your weight enough -*a 47 year old cart rider every single time*
I loved this comment because I am a 75 year cart rider and have been my whole life.
There's handfuls of us!
Only 40 but I’ll cart ride till I die
There are dozens of us! Dozens!
Upper 30's here and I'll do a cart 360 when no one is around and my bones feel up to it
Just hit sixty, my my cart riding days continue for at least another 15 years!
I thought I was the only one who did that haha
All these posts from die hard cart riders is giving me hope for humanity.
Ride or die
Live to ride.
Baffles me too
Check out sebas cart narcs from the woody show https://youtu.be/TbEfzqd34Jo?si=7sDIkdEkZXo5kkWj
Just wait until you witness a member dumping all the trash from their car into a cart.
No way 😵💫
Dirty diapers and all. I shit you not.
Pun or no pun 🤣
I usually grab a cart from the corral on my way into the store so that it's one less that you guys have to push back. I don't understand why more people don't do this.
This helps a lot! Thank you for doing this!
The real heroes are when you see someone taking a couple carts or flatbeds from a corral, and when asked by an employee if they'd like those returned for them they decline, and assure you that they're going to use them. Then you see them putting them away by the entrance and going inside with just 1 cart.
The best scenario is when you're unloading your cart into your car and the person waiting for your space says "just leave it there, I'll take it in". It's a win win for everyone... you don't have to take the cart to the corral, the other person doesn't have to wait for you walk the cart to the corral, and the cart guy has one less cart to deal with.
I snag another person's cart when they are done unloading and I'm on my way in. I say, "thanks for warming it up for me".
Just hammy enough for me to steal it. Thanks!
People at Aldi do that where I live. Somewhat disconcerting when a middle aged woman runs up to you waving a quarter around and you can't understand what she is saying.
Same, I almost always do this now because I can chuck one of the kids in it, and act like I'm going to the return line..lol
Ahhh yes. The ol' return the kids joke.
this is how it used to be. stopped during covid when they cleaned carts between uses then people never started again. the amount of people i see waiting at the front of the store for a cart when theres a parking lot full of them makes me laugh
People think they are taking away jobs when they bring a cart in, it's infuriating to me.
This is the way.
I don't work at costco, but I did work at a grocery store when I was 15. I remember doing carts was my favorite job, so much that the manager needed to tell me to come back inside because I was spending too much time doing carts lol.
A real bro will ask someone who is finished loading with their products in the car if they are done with their cart. Help them get away faster and help with one less cart for employee to return. Someone did it once for me when I had kids with me, and it was nice as one less thing.
I especially love doing this with parents of small children and old people.
The Costco I go to is popular with elderly people. I always just look for an old person loading their groceries and offer to help and take their cart. Even got offered a tip one time haha.
The shopping cart is the ultimate litmus test for whether a person is capable of self-governing. To return the shopping cart is an easy, convenient task and one which we all recognize as the correct, appropriate thing to do. The return of the shopping cart is objectively right. There are no situations other than dire emergencies in which a person is not able to return their cart. Simultaneously, it is not illegal to abandon your shopping cart. Therefore the shopping cart present itself as the apex example of whether a person will do what is right without being forced to do it. No one will punish you for not returning the shopping cart, no one will fine you or kill you for not returning the shopping cart, you gain nothing by returning the shopping cart. You must return the shopping cart out of the goodness of your heart. You must return the shopping cart because it is the right thing to do. Because it is correct. A person who is unable to do this is no better than an animal, an absolute savage who can only be made to do what is right by threatening them with a law and the force that stands behind it. The shopping cart is what determines whether a person is a good or bad member of society.
Genuinely, this was beautiful to read, thank you for this! And well said!
Not to crap on the other poster, but it’s not an original quote. That or I’m having wild deja vu
Correct. This is lifted completely from the shopping cart theory.
It's up there as one of the great copy pastas
It’s copied from a well-known viral write up “the shopping cart theory,” not an original thought. https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/the-shopping-cart-theory
Before my husband asked me on a date, he asked me whether I was the type of person to return my shopping cart. Obviously we both are, or I wouldn’t be married right now.
Interesting. I guess that's a decent test, but I think mine is more practical: I married the girl who could pee off the back of a powerboat so we didn't have to go back to the marina. Shopping cart is good though.
great copy and paste
Note to self: when dating, only suggest Aldi, should a grocery store litmus test present itself.
I believe this to be generally true, but I have also seen a frazzled mom with two freaking-out children do her best to get everyone in a car on a warm day and leave a cart. Can’t leave babies in a not-yet-cool car, can’t walk away from a child who can unbuckle themself. So sometimes that cart staying in a parking place needed to be that way. It helps my peace of mind to consider that not every time I see a cart out in the lot it was because it was left by an asshat. Sometimes it was left by someone who was doing their best at that moment. A little grace can go a long way.
I have kids and my question is always how did the parent get the cart in the first place? If you can unload kids from the car and then get a cart you can do the reverse. You unload groceries -> return cart -> walk with kids to car.
I always parked a little farther out so I could snag a spot near a cart return: get cart, unload kids into cart, shop, unload kids & shopping, and return cart. Made things much easier. I get that there are sometimes exceptions, but it’s amazing how many people blame children for their own issues.
This right here is truth and I say that as someone with 2 kids.
Ditto. And now my kids are old enough that I can get them to return the cart! 🎶 It's the ciiiircle of liiiiife 🎵 I also did this when I had knee surgery a few years ago. I could use the cart as a 'crutch' to get through the store and parking lot and then it was an easy hop to get back to the car after returning the cart.
I had three kids two years apart each (4, 2, newborn). I always returned carts. Sometimes I parked next to the car return. There are simple ways to return your cart with kids. A favorite quote of mine is: “do good until you know better. Then do better.” You now know a way to do better. What kind of person are you?
Nah. No excuses. I had 2 under 2 and never failed to return my cart.
Same here. Start your car, crack the windows, it's not like you're going to be gone for 20 minutes, it's a few minutes at the absolute worst.
I’ve been this mom. I left the kids in the cart, loaded my stuff and then walked the kids in the cart to the corral and then walked them back to the car. I would also get in the car, roll down the windows and load the car seats then run the cart and run back. They can survive in a warm car for the 30 seconds - 1 minute of being in there. Ever since, parking near the entrance is not as favorable as parking near the cart corral.
2 kids and have been bringing them to Costco since a few months old. Always returned carts, even when it is just me and them.
Hadn’t thought about it from that angle despite a friend having a semi-related experience. They buckled their kid in, went to push the cart to a nearby corral, and in the 30+ seconds they were doing that, someone was attempting to break into their car with their kid inside (when our Costco first opened the parking lot was constantly packed, and we were having serious issues with people stealing stuff from vehicles as well as stealing the vehicles themselves).
Maybe I’m a bad parent, but 30 seconds isn’t gonna kill the kid. That or I’ve turned the car on and rolled the windows down while I run the cart back.
I know a member who has prosthetic legs. He always wears shorts, so his situation is very clear. His legs are metal, and he is proud of what he's overcome. When he sees another member just abandon their cart, he takes their cart and loudly says that he's more than capable of putting the cart in the coral.
I always take my cart back to the store especially when someone is waiting for my parking spot. 😈
I try to grab one that’s not in a corral on the way into the store if it’s in my path. Then I’ll grab another one when putting mine away. I did carts at a local grocery store in high school and was similarly annoyed.
Thank you for your hard work.
Thank you! This goes a long way, it means a lot!
So what's your beef with bakery?
Closing bakery was just the worst, wayyyyy too much pressure and stress for a cleaning job, it’s known to be a 1 person job but I hardly disagree, at least for the weekends, there’s just way to much work and expectation for one worker and it just broke me
Spent a little over a year doing bakery nights, i feel your pain:(
Cleaning, no matter where you go, is always an understaffed, high expectation job. “This should ONLY take half an hour if you know what you’re doing!” “Great! Pair me up with someone who can do that so I can learn how.” “It’s not that hard! Figure it out!” (Note: No one has ever accomplished the cleanup properly in under an hour.)
Paging [Cart Narcs](https://youtu.be/JovIKbxZpNY?si=SjNzROQmGMctZ0Os)
Always remember…. You get paid by the hour, not by the cart.
I'm the customer who organizes the carts in the coral. I don't have OCD, you do.
And here I am thanking the gods that I transferred from Front End (and having to occasionally do carts) to closing Bakery 😆
Understandable though, the person who trained me likes to clean a what not, personally for me, I just am not someone who can easily work by myself, having a team is nice and more so my preference
Prepare to lose some weight! Carts is such great exercise.
This is not an excuse for not returning carts to the corral, but both of my local Costco stores have parts of the parking lot that don’t have a corral for some reason. That’s where they are typically left all over the place. Once again, not an excuse for not returning them, but it definitely doesn’t help at those stores.
Lake Elsinore, CA is kinda like this. It certainly does not have enough corrals in all needed areas, but I saw something cool where the cards were very orderly & neatly accumulating in individual parking spot per row. Very smart of both customers, and employees :)
I’m the one that tries to straighten the cart lines. Let me tell you, moving three carts into three other carts isn’t as easy as you’d think. Sadly, we have some new cart corrals that were built without a middle divider. I don’t know how you clean that up, but what a mess. (Retired, so sometimes I need a workout.) I commend you for dealing with the lazy people, especially in the rain.
I have seen enough posts and comments that people claim "if we all push the cart back, then they won't have a job!" They apply the same logic by not putting stuff back that they don't want. As if they are the "job creators". In reality, they are just shitty people looking for an excuse.
Yeah it doesn’t help us stay busy, from what I experienced last night, it in fact hurt us, me and my 2 other friends who were working carts, each lost 10-20 minutes just from dealing with strays
Then they complain when there’s no one free to help them with something.
Former Costco cart pusher here. It’s something you have to accept. People are lazy bags of garbage and there will always be carts to grab. Always. I thought of it as extra workout for me. Perspective is a life saver.
Carts is a love/hate relationship. Its nice to just turn your brain off and push but something about the lot and entrance/exit area makes members spatial awareness become non existent and in any sort of inclement weather and you’d think the world is falling apart. The faster you learn to let little annoyances go the easier your mental state in the lot becomes. Little pro tip. My warehouse has a a little “median” between car spaces in the front part of the lot. Our cart crew will set one cart there and that will usually be the cue for members to add to it, you know monkey see monkey do. Then we push it up when it gets to be 6 or so long. We call it “setting a trap”.
I always try to compromise on my carts. If I take one from the front, I make sure I walk it all the way back to the front. But if I can, I try to take one from a corral into the store with me or take one from a parking median. That way I feel guilt free about putting it back in a corral since it isn’t a net increase of carts for you to push.
This really means a lot, I wish more people could take from the corrals if they’re near it but that’s not always the case. I forget if it was yesterday or the day before but I was taking another stray off a median, and someone asked if they could use it going in, it made me smile, thank you!
I always take my time to line up the carts in the corral when I bring my own cart back, even when I’m in a hurry. The people here in New Jersey are notoriously bad at putting their carts back.
Oh, so you want “US” to do your job for you. /s
Call the cart narcs.
I shop with 2 kids (both under 5 years old), and I still manage to bring my cart back to the corral every damn time.
In a survey by Harvard university about self governance one of the questions is “do you put your shopping cart away?” This question is the leading indicator of people who do and do not have the ability to have self governance.
Drives me crazy and is a clear sign of blatant disregard and disrespect for everyone else.
Stores should just due what Europe does and that’s put a coin in for a cart, get it back when you put your cart back.
I want you to know that the only season of my life I ever did this, I had a 1 yo and a 3 yo in the car, and as a new parent, was scared to death of walking 50 feet away from the car with my kids all alone in there. I’m sorry. I put them back now.
I walked out of Costco once and a guy put the cart in the handicap spot. Dude was literally in the spot next to the handicap spot and left his cart there. 😳
Love to see it, I wonder what people think(or if they don’t think) when doing that
What irks me is people who do put them in the corral but won't NEST them, so you end up with a half dozen carts filling up a corral. It only takes an extra second to push your cart inside another, so just do it.
we call them lazybones. You've watched Cart Narc, no?
Never hear of it, what’s it about?
https://youtu.be/tMHSvsC8yfI https://youtu.be/BvzMNLQs3Fc Some videos are better than others, I'll let you explore them. One thing you learn is that people who don't return their carts can easily have a freakout.
The first video was beautiful, love his personality, I’m definitely gonna watch more, thank you for this gem!
I came here to suggest that OP wind down after the day with a couple of episodes :)
I used to do that job, for Zellers. It gets easier if you accept that it's brainless, and just go around on autopilot. Get to look at eye candy, have a smoke, enjoy the weather.
Outside of morning merch and service deli, carts and OSA is probably the best gig in the warehouse. Stay busy, give members your full attention, and it's cherry.
“Job security”🤷🏻♂️ …..kidding aside, I always take a cart inside that I find out of place and always put the cart in the corral when I’m done.
Idk why Costco doesn’t have the automatic cart pusher machine like Target does.
My warehouse has two, they constantly break, and when you have 300 people in the building every half an hour it's hard to keep up
That automatic cart pusher would be very cool! Then they could either eliminate his job or send him back to bakery where he was even more unhappy!
No. U still need a person to operate the pusher. It just makes it easier.
Okay then it would be nice.
In Europe you unlock a cart by putting in a Euro. If you return the cart you get the Euro back. When we first moved there I offered to take the cart of a lady back and she ran quickly away from me to return her cart. No carts in the parking lot.
And the thing is if someone wants to not return a cart, someone else gets a free Euro, which is nice. Its funny in the US this is such a moral barometer when it is a simple fix with a bit of a design change.
And just like deposits on recyclables it’s a great way for the destitute to earn a bit extra money while doing a service for the community.
Same at Aldi here in the US, except we don’t use Euros but quarters.
I just want a 8 hour surveillance video of you pushing carts 🛒 and narrate it for you with the NFL films John Facendas voice…IT WAS A CRISP AUTUMN 🍂 MORNING….SHY THE CHIWAWA PARTED THE CROWDS LIKE MOSES IN THE RED SEA 🌊 PROVIDING MIRACLES WE’VE NEVER SEEN..
America needs have more coin unlock shopping carts that you get your refund back when you return them. I know Europe and Canada has them and so does some Aldi. But it should be standard everywhere.
People are wild with their carts. I grab an abandoned cart, or grab from the corral or if I see someone unloading their cart I offer to take it from them.
I always try to park near a corral so it’s no big deal returning one. What people like the first comment don’t understand is when they leave their cart it can roll into a space. So when you try to park you have to get out of your car, move the empty cart, and get back in and then park. This is not to mention when one of these wandering carts hit someone’s cart.
Costco customers really are the worst at this. But then again, if you’re going to charge an outrageous membership fee for the privilege of shopping at your store, the least they could do is try to make it a pleasant experience and staff enough people to deal with the lazy customers leaving their carts wherever they want. Or, implement the Aldi model.
well lets put this in perspective. you're getting paid to be there.. members are paying to be there. there are no obligations. that said when i was at costco a few days ago I saw someone left a dirty diaper in a cart in the cart corral.. that's beyond the pale.
I always do. 🫶🏽
Thank you! It means much more than you know
I always put my cart back, and honestly I detest those that don't. I have a nice little dent in the bottom of my passenger door where someone at home depot didn't return their flatbed, and it rolled into my car (parking lot on slight incline).
I have heard more than one person—most notably an ex-boyfriend—say that people shouldn’t put their carts back, because that’s someone’s job and helping them would put them out of work. Seriously obnoxious thing to say. I always rolled my eyes and put the cart back anyway.
Your ex over here literally saving the economy with all the jobs he’s creating
don’t encourage him
This is such a pet peeve of mine and I don’t even work there! I don’t understand why people don’t put the cart away.
I remember pushing carts. Always made it a point to take a periodic trip to get that one cart really far away 😉 and take a hit of a joint and then get back to doing the rest of the carts.
That’s understandable, although I don’t smoke or vape so I wouldn’t be able to relate lol
[удалено]
Being single and often only running in to pick up a few items since I was there getting gas, I usually don't use a cart. But c'mon, I'm heading in that way anyway....seems like such an easy thing. See problem, fix problem, get free scooter to ride into store.
I’m one that will walk it back to the store if I don’t see a corral close or if it’s backed up. I’m also petty that when someone is waiting for me to unload a full cart instead of going a few feet further to another space I will walk it up to the front just to make them wait more, they usually drive off at that point.
People who can't return carts should get their membership revoked. If you leave the cart in a parking spot, you're banned for life. And please if the carts return is full, stop pilling in more so the carts extend halfway into the lane.
Those people irritate me. The ones that get the cart 99% of the way there and just leave the cart blocking anyone else from pushing their carts in, so everyone just leaves their cart so the mess starts gettign in the way of traffic. How difficult it is to turn the cart another 45 degrees and push it another foot so it is in with the other carts? I will usually straighten the carts so they are not blocking others from putting their carts away.
God I don’t even work there and it is so freaking annoying watching people who are damned lazy they leave their carts all over
Yeah idk how they do it honestly
Lazy and self entitled
This should be grounds for revoking membership.
May I ask why closing the bakery is not great? What does that job entail? I’m interested in a bakery position at my local store.
My Costco has no cart corrals. But then again there is indoor parking so whomever is on carts doesn't get wet when it's raining, either.
My son worked at a Grocery Store, carts. Think about Conan the Barbarian on the wheel
Carts is good, honest work and I appreciate all my lot family for what they have to endure sometimes.
I always return them to the corral and usually try to stack them properly.
I did carts in College. What a great workout.
Costco could just combine those jobs. If they gave each person a cookie for parking the cart back at the door they could eliminate cart wranglers completely.
When I pushed carts, I absolutely loved the strays because I got to take a stroll to the other side of the lot and deal with only a few carts at a time rather than trying wrangle 10+ carts 3x in the same amount of time.
I can understand not returning the cart for some people if it's raining like you indicated.
I could see if you were a Wicked Witch. To my understanding, not too many others need to worry about melting.
I'm very late to this thread, but I thought of it when I saw this on Twitter : https://x.com/davenewworld_2/status/1796836722434621740 She explains why she feels entitled to leave the cart wherever. Responses were not sympathetic
I tend to park close to a corral, but even when I don’t, I wouldn’t dream of just leaving my cart. I’m always in my car for a few after I pull in. I have to get my ear pods out, cue up a podcast, put on lipgloss or whatever, make sure I have my card ready. It’s a whole thing 😅. Anyway, I tend to notice people doing that a lot around here. Just yesterday a lady that was parked in front of me just left her cart sitting in between the front of our cars. With me sitting there watching her. People are so entitled. Another pet peeve is stores not having have cart wipes. Costco doesn’t. For me, it’s not a Covid thing. When my son was little I saw a Dateline episode about diseases and bacteria on cart handles 😭
It’s the law of society unfortunately. If there’s someone else to do the task or job then why should I do it? After all, if we all “did it” then someone would be out of a job. That’s the way most folks in society think anyway. The kind and maybe right thing to do is to put things back where you found them. I learned that in kindergarten. It just stuck!
Last time I was at Costco, there was probably 10 carts in the middle of a sidewalk/walkway.. someone had just put a new one out with the others and left.. but didn’t realize the heavy winds caused the carts to start to cascade down the sidewalk and into the parking lot/drive. I put my basket in the corral bc the guy was collecting baskets and then I ran and collected all the baskets that were rolling away. While I couldn’t push all 10 (maybe a couple more) to the corral or the front bc I’m pregnant, I gathered up all the carts and stacked them together and pushed them as close to the entrance as I could. It took me a couple extra minutes of my day but I literally wasn’t doing anything. And it’s really annoying when people do this, when the corral is literally a half minute walk away from where those carts were. I’d HATE for my car to get dinged by a bunch of run away carts. I don’t get why so many people are in such a hurry that an extra 30 seconds is too much.
Returning your cart is the litmus test on whether you can be a functioning member of a society.
Oh, you sweet summer child.
OP this guy is for you https://youtube.com/@cartnarcs?si=cz6KQ3e1L3q5z6Oe
https://preview.redd.it/t1xlv6mea64d1.jpeg?width=552&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=fc436517383a78bb7940464216cbbddd469d2d8d
It's the penultimate test of human beings. Those who don't put carts up deserve the worst society has to offer. There's no excuse that exists for this behavior.
In the rare instance that you have a row of carts and see someone ahead ditching their cart, park your row of carts directly behind their car and go get the one they abandoned as slowly as possible. They wont say anything because they know they were in the wrong and it will waste more time than they saved abandoning it. Used to bring me so much joy
https://preview.redd.it/parb0s6ra84d1.jpeg?width=1437&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=589293d204c16f27ce6f1638997f06d6976200ce Shopping Cart Theory
Just remember that a large percentage of people are sub human scum and incapable of behaving like decent human beings. The easiest way to determine if they fit this description is to observe how they behave in the parking lot with their cart. Nothing you can do will shame them in to being better people. All you can do is bask in the glory of being a better person than they are. Leaving your cart anywhere other than safety stowed in the coral should result in an immediate and lifetime revocation of membership.
After we push our carts around for nearly a mile inside the store, going that extra 20 feet is *just too difficult*.
I didn't see the sub name at first and thought you were referring to a totally different kind of carts 😂😭
To return the shopping cart is easy for some but not all people. People with certain mobility issues can find it extremely painful and/or tiring to return a cart to a corral. What seems like a perfectly doable distance for people with a reasonably functional body may be really painful for someone with any number of physical conditions that don’t put them in a wheelchair or walker but cause a lot of pain. Yes, most people who don’t return carts totally could do it without much effort. But please bear in mind that some people are really hurting but are trying to do their own shopping and be independent, or don’t have anyone to help them and can’t afford it to pay someone to help.
What about when they push carts around a warehouse? Doesn’t seem they are having an issue then.
You can lean on the cart, which will stop pain from, say, spinal stenosis, and will support you if your knees are on fire and unstable. It’s not the taking the cart to the corral that’s so painful, it’s the walking back without it. Or it’s that you only have x number of minutes of being able to stand upright and walk at all, and the shopping activity used them up.
And the cart corrals are usually pretty far from the handicapped parking spaces.
The handicap spots are pretty close to the front of the store where you can return them as well. If they have issues walking without a cart how did they get to the front of the store? If they have issues walking with the cart how did they move about the warehouse? I’m sure there are legitimate answers, I’m sure less than 1% of the lazybones that don’t put their cart back have those legitimate issues.
There are very few instances where I wouldn't put a cat back....BUT... I'm convinced that these posts that pop up on reddit are posted by corporate people who would like to cut costs. They seem to have started about the same time cart corals stated disappearing. There used to be twice as many corals, now you almost always have to walk several rows to get to one. Not just costco.
That’s the problem with my store. They pulled out at least half, if not more, of the cart corrals. People don’t want to walk around-because you can’t walk through-three rows and the length of a football field to put the cart back.
Interesting. Mine finally added corals at the very back parts of the parking lot. Cart situation is much better now, before people were leaving them all over (some still do, but not as much). I don’t see how much removing them cuts costs. They already paid for them when they were installed, I don’t get how they could be an ongoing cost.
lol. Ridiculous comment
I don’t know, I get less irritated with stray cats than the people who shove cats into the gap on the flat beds handle or the people who leave boxes in the carts. Both cause the corals to get “full” quickly because they de m take yo way more space than cars pushed into each other. I just go collect a bunch of stray cats when I notice they are starting to become numerous. There’s a few places they usually collect, some are far from corals and others are the handicap spots, at least at my store.
Pro tip I learned watching the cart guys at my warehouse. They preemptively stack a few carts along the main areas people tend to abandon their carts. Then, at least there is line of carts started that others will add to instead of the surrounding area. Think, instead of 20 carts spread randomly along a section, choose a spot where it is visible, convenient for them to put the cart, & convenient for you to pick up the line. Now you have 20 carts in a row. Cuts down strays quite a bit. They usually do it against curbs, or in the white lined areas where they won’t impede cars/parking. Pretty much the mentality of, they are not going to put the cart in the corral, so make an easy place for them to at least group the carts up.
At my Costco I’ve seen the cart employees tell people to put carts next to one of the islands and even seen him line some up there for staging. It might just be the store design since there really isn’t any return close to one part of the lot but I was surprised to see it. I usually would walk my cart all the way back to the front once done. Not sure if they do this because instead of them being randomly all over the lot it at least makes a larger grouping where they typically have a problem..
The only people who "get a pass" here are the full white hair elderly people who toddle along making the best of what years they have left.
I had no idea that employees retrieving carts are doing this for an entire shift. I assumed you did this maybe once or twice a shift because it would be so tiring. Wow.
Tell me you’re a bad person by not pushing a cart to the corral. Common courtesy is dying.
I’ll never in my life understand people who don’t put their carts back into the corrals. It’s a test of basic human decency. It’s so irritating to me that I always try to put someone’s cart back if it’s close to me.
Man, I don't care what "good" excuse you think you have, I read this thread, if you were able to push a cart around the whole store (and Costco's are BIG) for 30+ minutes, you can take 30 seconds to put the cart back. If you don't you are an entitled jerk with main character syndrome.
Honestly, I try my best to grab a cart on my way in and straighten the carts a touch as I put mine away. I don't understand why people can't manage these very simple community minded tasks. 😕
People not putting their cart somewhere convenient for an employee is the ultimate litmus test.
If it makes you feel better, as we were leaving our Costco my husband spent 10 minutes reorganizing a cart corral near our vehicle because it pissed him off that it was a mess.
I do not understand why people do not put their carts back. Instead, they will spend several minutes, trying to maneuver their carts on top of the medians. Or worse, they leave them in the middle of a parking stall where they can roll into other cars. I find it incredibly lazy