Tuesday, January 29

 
Another reason to go grocery-shopping alone

Today's food-marketing horror note: Toys R Us is testing out toy-sales kiosks at four Giant supermarkets in Washington, D.C., and Virginia. ("Kiosk" is a little misleading here; at 600 to 1400 square feet in size, they're about the size of my house.) It's part of TRU's quest to wrest toy-sales dominance away from Wal-Mart. A TRU representative - who obviously has never had to struggle with a toy-crazed child at either TRU or the supermarket - said the typical parent goes to the grocery store 96 times a year but only 4-5 times a year to TRU. Why do you suppose that is? I guess now that TRU is looking at putting toy kiosks in stores, I can look forward to more toy tantrums, overpriced merchandise and surly store clerks. On the positive side, this might cut down on the requests to buy treats at the check-out.
posted by Unknown 1:50 PM