This pandemic is really starting to scare me.

I rarely leave the house as it is..just to get groceries.

Now, I am even reconsidering that.

Does ordering them online seem to work out ok? Any tips from anyone who has done it? TIA

I buy groceries online from Walmart. I drive there at the appointed time, and a nice person loads them in my trunk. Easy peasy.

They have certain hours for at-risk people. It's 7 am - 8 am where I live.

Was gonna last week and when I got to the store and called the number the guy said they were three hours behind so I just said forget it.

I just went ahead and started eating online...

I order our groceries on-line all the time. There are a few local grocery stores that deliver. I stay away from things like Instacart, which I tried once and it was a nightmare of an experience. As long as I stick with my local stores, I don't have any problems at all.

My brother and sister-in-law did it for a while, and it worked well for them. I think my sister-in-law said something to the effect that you may not get everything that you order.

I have used Safeway and they do a pretty good job. Some of them also do curbside. Make sure you click no subs if you don't want them. We have used a local market a lot that does curbside. I have to check everything well because they will forget to get things from the bakery or frozen stuff. I also do some from Amazon and Walmart "deliver to home". No way in hell would I go in and ours doesn't do curbside. I have also ordered from FoodServiceDirct.com PAY ATTENTION to the quantity and packaging. Keep an eye on the shipping too. They do have some stuff that ships free but it is item by item.

Is your email still a name and a number? I have something to send you.

Our Safeway doesn't deliver. No one does. The only market is a phony health food store which is short on food and long on dodgy supplements.

There are plenty of farms, but they're mostly monoculture and so spread out that you'd spend a day going hither and yon. :(

When I lived in King County, Safeway delivered, and they did a pretty good job. And like you wrote - tell them no substitutions.

About once a week I'll treat myself to something from DoorDash. It's helped keep a lot of our restaurants going, and at least we have some decent restaurants. But it's so, so expensive. Plus I think I've gained 20# due to this COVID crap.

That's why I need a drum kit!

> Plus I think I've gained 20# due to this COVID
> crap.

You're not supposed to eat it, Beth.

Yes, Susan, name and birth year.@gmail.

I've been using Instacart for longer than a year. On the whole I really like it. Fresh produce is the only real problem area. The shoppers do not always choose the best. Aside from that and some unwanted substitutions it has been great.

It wasn't a good experience with the first store that we tried.
The employees were the shoppers, and we went to the curb to pick up.
I had ordered a couple of sweet potatoes and they gave me two that were the size of a cigar.
The packaged ground beef that the person selected was about the size of my fist.
That was the first and last time with that store.
The second time was the charm; we used a different store and the shopper was great; selected the best he could and texted me while he was shopping whenever the item requested was gone and if I would like a substitute.
With the weather getting colder and Covid numbers going up, we may go back to doing this again.

I order online using curbside pickup, as well as delivery when necessary, for Safeway, Kroger (Fred Meyer), Home Depot, Walmart, and
Costco.

Overall, it has been great. I only order grocery items that are prepackaged - including prepackaged quantities of fresh fruits and vegetables - so I can sanitize the package as it comes into my home.

I started in 2012 when I broke my leg. Liked it so well I never stopped. Now I do pickup, but when I first started I had delivery. Never had an issue.

Yes, and I've been doing it for the last eight years. As a totally blind person, I find it a lot easier to order online and have items delivered than to have to take a taxi or find a friend to take me to the store.

Safeway and Amazon deliver so I have no hurdles there. I've never found Instacart to be accessible to screenreading software on a desktop computer so if I have to use a service other than the two mentioned, I use shipt.com which is owned by Target and is quite accessible. However, I use Shipt as a last resort because 1) their shoppers/drivers do not always pick out the exact items I want; 2) the drivers/shoppers are paid like waiters and waitresses, meaning I have to pay them a tip (both Safeway and Amazon discourage this); and 3) I have to pay Shipt's prices which are higher than the stores they service, and the newspaper ads I might clip for coupons do not apply to Shipt (or Instacart for that matter) purchases. Good luck!

I have a small boutique market that I use often. Not the selection and a bit pricier than Safeway but I can get in and out in 20 minutes. I am getting more and more leary of big stores and crowds.

I go the first or last hour the store is open. The place is borderline empty, and the store insists on masks.

The grocery stores who do offer on line shopping have now reserved the best parking near the front of the store for on line pickups so those of us who do shop in person have to park further away, not happy about that.

Secondly, as if navigating aisles wasn't bad enough before, you are now having aisles blocked by store pickers with their damned carts and multiple crates stacked on them, they take up a lot of room.

Lastly, upon leaving the store I am always interested in observing those who are there waiting or are being loaded up and few if any seem to be disabled or elderly who would justify on line ordering.

In my mind it is a bad idea, get off your lazy a** and go do your own shopping!

Some people are just very cautious about exposing themselves to Covid, and given the escalating numbers, I can't say that I blame them. My 80-something, COPD neighbor orders online and does contactless pickup at the grocery store. So does my friend in her mid-70s. I think it's a sensible option for those who need or want it.

I hear you on prime parking spots being reserved for pick-up orders. I thought about it, though -- it's more for the hard-working employees so they don't have to walk so far. But year, it does seem to be a slap in the face for the rest of us.

Who knows, if the numbers keep going up, I may do online w/pickup myself.

I don't like HUNTING/ shopping or even eating online..

Shopping is too much like hunting unless you can go down the isle of the store virtually seeing and selecting things - and EXPERIENCING Other Shoppers, in their joviality and kindness, or haste and angst... - as they would be, and checked out by a real person, virtually, of course, thereby having close to a real, if QUICK, (random) experience.

MOST online shopping experiences could take anywhere from 15 minutes to about 2 hours, for me, EACH TIME. If the former, possibly; the latter, ain't gonna happen. Too many hurdles. Too many possibilities, and/ or IMPOSSIBILITIES.

I prefer to find my food in the wild! In the river, in the air, on a tree (peaches, apples, pecans, cherries, coconuts, money...), bush (blueberries, tomatoes, merry jane...), vine (vino), underground (carrots, beets, taters, garlic...), truck, computer screen, billboard, advertisement, or BETTER YET, on the table...