grocery shopping for introverts

Here in Northwest Arkansas, home of Walmart, they like to make us the guinea pigs for their new processes, services, store layouts, etcetera. They completely remodeled the Walmart Supercenter I go to to include a lot of neat ways to shop (Scan and Go, self check-out for big orders, new store layout) which includes the wonderful thing that is Grocery Pick-up.

Here is how it works. You go to Walmart.com.

Right there in the top right corner of the page there is a link "FREE Walmart Grocery Pickup." Oh yeah. It's free. So you click on that and it has you put in your zip code to see if any of your local stores participate in this. If you have one, you get to get started! Basically you search for all the grocery items you usually buy and add them to your cart. When you're done, check out and it will have you select a pick up time. These times are typically one hour time slots on the following day.

At your self-designated time, you show up to your pick up location, sign in to the drive through kiosk (my location also allows you to pick up home and pharmacy orders) and pull in the the parking space it gives you. A Walmart associate brings out all your groceries, has you sign for your receipt, and loads your vehicle for you. Yes, this is all for free! Well, you pay for your groceries. Duh. Then you drive away happy because you didn't have to deal with any crazy people inside the store or a long line for the check out. Or anything. Because the whole pickup process takes like 10 minutes.

I also find that I save money by not being tempted to pick up all my impulse buys when I go into the store.

Let's just say. With a newborn to drag along with me to get groceries. I'm in love.