Niche Area of Outrage

Early this morning, I pulled into our West location to find the middle section of the parking lot taped off for a construction project. It appears the lines were being repainted in front of the old Macy’s building, which makes total sense since the building has been empty for years. Ahem. I’ll say it now: I’m fully expecting the painting of parking lot lines to cost $23,487 and when we receive the statement for our share, it will just say “paint” in the most low-key and innocuous way.

And while we are on the subject of parking lots at West, you would be astounded to find out many people drive through the parking lot at harrowing speeds to reach the McDonald’s drive-thru line. I watched a Jeep Cherokee and a Sysco food delivery truck almost collide in the Cherokee’s zeal to get breakfast. (This isn’t really related but whoever is writing the health inspection news for the local paper is SLAYING ME. The one last week started with something along the lines of “If you ate a hash brown from the McDonald’s on Stadium Blvd last week, it may have been handled by someone not wearing gloves.” That’s very dramatic. Also, it’s fast food, so I think that really as long as someone didn’t drop the hash brown on the floor and then pick it up and put it in the bag, we are really not that surprised.)

And all that reminds me that two of our three food vendors have moved their minimum order from 15 cases of product to 20 cases of product. And by case, consider a gallon jug of milk. There are four gallons in one case, so while you are getting four physical items, it counts as one case on the order. Without question, food vendors are making it harder for small business to order. If you’ve ever been in Sam’s during the week and seen someone with a flatbed of items that looked like were going directly to a restaurant’s kitchen, it’s because of inane rules like this. And the problem with going to Sam’s is that it is generally more expensive but also an enormous use of time to go get it all, load it all in the car, bring it back, and unload it all.

My guess is that this wasn’t done as a cost saving mechanism for the delivery companies as they argue (on the theory they don’t stop for smaller orders), but more of a way to prevent us from cost shopping between vendors. Occasionally I’ll use up to three vendors a week to find the best prices for what we need, but now that two of the three require 20 cases each, that becomes much harder to do. And in our busiest times, we often get trucks in twice a week because we simply don’t have the space to accommodate all the groceries we will need for the entire week.

Obviously, this is a niche area of outrage. I’m sure far more people care about the proper handling of their hash brown than they do about minimum case amounts from the larger food vendors such as US Foods and Performance Food Group. But goodness if it doesn’t irritate me to just no end. As if things aren’t difficult enough now for small business with current food pricing, requiring we buy even more of it at once even if we don’t really need it is AN ACTUAL OUTRAGE.

Thanks. I feel better for having said it. I’m going to write a book and title it “Niche Area of Outrage”.