Grocery bags

I try to remember to take my cloth bags with me when I go grocery shopping. I usually remember 90% of the time. I go to the same store on the same day of the week at approximately the same time of day (yes, I'm a creature of habit). Well in AZ if I put my cloth bags on the conveyor belt and then all my groceries it was clearly understood that I wanted my cloth bags to be used first. Apparently that isn't so clear here (at least where I shop).

Last week there was no bagger person, so it was the cashier and me. He started pulling out the plastic bags but then looked up and saw me loading stuff into the cloth ones and said, "oh, you want to use cloth". I really bit my tongue in an effort to avoid the sarcastic response that was ready to spew forth.

This week, I followed my routine again- bags on the conveyor belt, then groceries. There were three bagging ladies, plus the cashier. The first bagging lady understood the implications of the bags. She loaded up one bag, then left. Another lady started to bag, pulling out the plastic bags. I asked her to please use the cloth. Then the third lady placed my milk in the cart, not in a bag. I asked her to please place the milk in the third cloth bag. (By this time the second bagging lady had finished her bag and disappeared.) So the milk went in the bag. Now there were two packages of meat, a carton of veg. stock and a small jar left on the belt. The third bagging lady looks at the milk in the bag and then looks at me blankly and asked, "well where do you want the rest of this stuff?" I told her very nicely that it would all fit into the cloth bag - not only was there plenty of room, but cloth bags are also much stronger than flimsy plastic grocery bags. She honestly look surprised that I could fit all my groceries into 3 cloth bags.

Apparently at this store they are a little unclear on the concept of cloth grocery bags.