{"id":80496,"date":"2014-12-04T16:39:10","date_gmt":"2014-12-04T21:39:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/?p=80496"},"modified":"2014-12-04T16:39:10","modified_gmt":"2014-12-04T21:39:10","slug":"stock","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2014\/12\/04\/stock\/","title":{"rendered":"Stock"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Fredmeyer\"<\/a>

Photo: lyzadanger, via Flickr<\/p><\/div>\n

There are a few things you need to understand about the particular grocery store I\u2019m about to discuss. It\u2019s part of a New York chain, but it is not what anyone would call a supermarket; it\u2019s on the small side, for starters, with none of the slickness or charm one might associate with supermarkets.\u00a0<\/p>\n

It\u2019s in a basement. You descend a broken escalator to a time that knows no season, no hour, no change. There is never any music playing; it is usually empty. There is a single, dejected cashier. It has that vaguely rancid smell endemic to urban supermarkets, with base notes of wet cardboard, old vegetables, and less-than-immaculate deli slicers.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Oh, and lest you think it is cheap\u2014it\u2019s not. The unit pricing is generally about 10\u00a0percent higher than that of the two other markets in a mile radius. Its one advantage is that it is open late, until midnight most evenings, although late-night trips there are even drearier than usual.\u00a0<\/p>\n

None of this is the point, however. The noteworthy thing about this market is its mysterious organization. Almost nothing is where you might expect it to be: baking needs share an aisle with cleaning supplies; pet food and dried fruit are cheek by jowl; spices are to be found in three different places, sorted by brand. (Herbs are in a different place completely.)\u00a0The selection is vast, but arbitrary. On a recent visit, I found they had no whole milk\u2014although they stocked no fewer than five varieties of eggnog, including dairy-free, low-carb, and organic.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The stockers, when they appear, are remarkable: you can ask where to find white vinegar and they\u2019ll explain it\u2019s next to a heretofore unknown Asian section in aisle three, as if it were the most natural thing in the world. And you will have to ask. Finding anything on your own is an exercise in frustration. If you do stumble upon what you need, it\u2019s by sheer luck, and you don\u2019t feel any sense of accomplishment.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Generally, I love wandering the aisles of a grocery store. Initially, I even thought it might be a fun challenge to myself to try to run to earth-tricky things. But after you learn that the liquid smoke is with the prebottled lemon juice and the candied peel is not with dried fruit, nor baking stuff, nor even candy, but is, in fact, in the produce aisle, this palls. The few other shoppers look disoriented and exhausted, and everything takes twice as long as you imagine it will.\u00a0We\u2019ve all read about stores that deliberately arrange their goods so that shoppers spend a long time on the premises\u2014Anthropologie or Ikea. But this feels different.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The thought cannot help but intrude that the whole thing is an elaborate setup; that we are being gaslighted or maybe studied like mice in a maze. It would be an expensive experiment, yes, but as we know from movies, sinister higher-ups will stop at nothing in their pursuit of godlike omnipotence. Anyway, you start to feel that way after spending a few hours underground.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

There are a few things you need to understand about the particular grocery store I\u2019m about to discuss. It\u2019s part of a New York chain, but it is not what anyone would call a supermarket; it\u2019s on the small side, for starters, with none of the slickness or charm one might associate with supermarkets.\u00a0 It\u2019s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":178,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[13115],"tags":[16278,115,16275,16277,125,16276,6664],"class_list":["post-80496","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-our-daily-correspondent","tag-confusion","tag-food","tag-grocery-stores","tag-layout","tag-new-york-city","tag-organization","tag-shopping"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nInside the World\u2019s Worst-Organized Grocery Store<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Sadie Stein puzzles through a maze of a market.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2014\/12\/04\/stock\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Stock by Sadie Stein\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"December 4, 2014 \u2013 There are a few things you need to understand about the particular grocery store I\u2019m about to discuss. 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