S/O Supply Chain - shopping habits

My habits have not changed much at all. I do make sure to always have two packs of toilet paper, plenty of Clorox wipes, and plenty of Kleenex.

I've never really been a shopper for fun. I shop with a list and intent to get exactly what's on it. I've refined that during the pandemic. I rarely go into the grocery store-I order online. I shop for a LOT on Amazon. I haven't tried on clothes in a store in ages. If I do go into the store in person (Sam's club every 3-4 months or the grocery store in person about once a month) I go on days/times that are not busy such as early morning during the week.

I do enjoy shopping for home decor and have gone to a few stores (maybe 3-4?) in the past year and a half. When numbers were low and masked. Currently our numbers are high so I just don't go many places.

I enjoy a Target and Starbucks run occasionally but the past several times I've been in the store, I left with the basics that were on my list and no "fun" stuff. I've noticed seasonal offerings are drastically reduced and that's what I normally impulse buy.

I stayed home for 14 months and all shopping was done via curbside pickup or Amazon.  Now I mostly do curbside, but I do go into the store if I don't have a big shop, but it has to be early in the morning, before crowds. If I have to go to a mall, I go first thing and only to the intended store. I park at the closest entrance to that store. Once I had my second shot and waited 2 weeks I started to run quick errands. I do 99% of my shopping for everything online.  Amazon is huge for a reason.

It'll be a while before I go inside of a restaurant or movie theater. Dh and I both miss going to musicals and concerts, but we'll wait until it's truly safe.

The pandemic hit the same time DH and I became empty nesters more or less. So it's been a learning curve to cook for 2. I have always been someone who has a full pantry and freezer, but I'm trying harder to reduce food waste. These days I do try to keep an extra of my most used cleaning products vs. buying a new one when the current gets used up. I still shop a lot online, but don't have a problem going into a store either.

I completely agree, and this is one of those cases where I'm kind of happy my mother didn't live to see this. She was terrified of the computer and refused to do ANY online banking. If she had lived and gone into the assisted apartment, I would have been the one stuck doing it for her, which would have been a huge loss of independence for her.

OP, I started using target drive up and haven't switched. I love it- no more impulse buys from just browsing. As for the grocery store I don't like the online order/pickup system we have. In the beginning all the slots were taken and it was impossible to get one. As someone who is not high risk I felt like I could mask up and shop and let others who could not take those slots. As things eased, I did try it and the shopper made so many substitutions or grabbed the wrong thing - whole milk instead of 2%, the wrong box of crackers. There was a huge line at pickup and we had to get out of the car to help them load the groceries. Forget it, I'd rather shop once a week with my list and come home and shower.

The main thing that has changed for me is grocery shopping. I used to shop every day, or every second day at most, partly due to lack of storage and fridge space, and partly to get out of the apartment for a bit. Now I try to consolidate into fewer trips. DH does a major shop on Saturday, and I do a refresh maybe Wednesday or Thursday, unless I need to be out on another day.
I was never a big browser, but that has completely stopped now. If I need something, I will go shopping, but I haven't been into a shop 'just to look' since March 2020.

I don’t think I’ve been inside a bank in at least 20 years. I do everything in the drive thru.

I only did grocery pick up even before Covid. I hate grocery shopping with a passion.

I definitely keep more food in the house now. We didn’t eat at home much before. We were always out and about and having lunch or dinner with friends after all our activities. Before Covid I could count on one hand the number of meals we had at home in a month.

That’s about it.

I changed grocery stores because the one I used does not offer curbside pick up and I did not want to be in a store that did not enforce masks very well...

Since I curbside pick up 95% of our groceries, that means we get food once a week so I have gotten better at meal planning... I do run in to the store once in a while to grab stuff my main store doesn't have.

I go to Target much less often...

We order from Costco and have it sent to the house instead of going in (nothing perishable.)

I have not been very good about having a stash of things for emergencies because it disappears faster than I can buy it... teenagers! At least they don't eat soap and toilet paper, that I have been able to keep stocked up.

The way I my stock of groceries and other household items has definitely changed. I used to go to the store and have enough food on hand for about a week. Now I purchased a new freezer at the beginning of the pandemic and always have it well stocked, including my pantry. I almost feel a little panicky when it starts to run a little low and immediately feel the urge to go shopping to replace items.

Also toilet paper, I always have to have 1 costco brand tp, the entire new bag as back up. And disposable masks, hand sanitizer and basically everything that ran out the last time. We are a family of 6 and I have real PTSD from not being able to find food and TP from the 1st go round. Now I'm determined never to be caught in that situation again.

I still shop in store though, just at early hours when there is less people and not as often as I used to. I used to be in the store several times a week, now maybe once every 2 weeks.

i stock the freezer more. prior to the lock downs, DH and I would eat out a lot so i never really kept food in the house. for our 28 year marriage leading up to that point, i don't think we ever even ate lunch at home even on the weekends.

when the pandemic happened, i had to start cooking more at home. i also made even less trips to the supermarket so i just learned to stockpile meats. i still don't know how to stockpile dry goods (someone please come and get the panic-buying boxes of Hamburger Helper that i bought) but at least i have meats.

Having a reserve always on hand to cover shortages and getting groceries delivered outside on the driveway rather than the driver coming indoors, and being more flexible in choices for substitutions.

I find that I plan my shopping trips much more. I have an ap called In-Store that allows me to keep a running list of items at various stores or types of stores. I'll wait until my list is long enough to make it seem worth a trip before I go anywhere. I really like shopping online and then doing curbside pick up. I hope that is a feature that sticks around longterm. And I love having someone else do my grocery shopping, then doing curbside pick up. It makes menu planning and shopping list one smoothly synchronized chore for me. No impulse buys. My shopping list directing reflects what I am planning for the coming week's meals, so less wasted produce, fewer things languishing in the pantry.

For groceries, we found out that our (only) store has curbside pickup, or maybe it started because of the pandemic. Regardless, we haven’t done our own grocery shopping since last April and I doubt we will go back to it except for rare occasions.

Also, used to shop week to week and almost everything we eat is fresh so if we didn’t go shopping that week, we had nothing to fall back on. Maybe a package of chicken in the freezer. But we literally had maybe 6 items in our pantry, and a couple of those were likely tuna packets, so nothing to help us there either. Thanks goodness for the peas who were sharing their experiences with us, we were able to stock some things before everything went crazy.

Now we have a freezer in the garage fully stocked with our favorite proteins, some frozen fruits and veggies which we don’t love, but will have if getting fresh food is an issue again. Or, you know, we don’t get the grocery order in that week. And we are trying to learn to cook with some frozen veggies. No great successes so far. We also have more food in our pantry, but not tons because we can’t eat it. And since we have more freezer space we also make and freeze more ‘extra’ meals than we did before.

We have a stocked box of shelf stable food items for emergencies. And another for when we are sick.

Other products line paper goods, hygiene supplies and cleaning supplies we kept stocked (which saved our bacon and some friends and family) now we just keep more stocked than before.

We don’t go browsing in stores any more. I’m sure eventually we will do some of that again, but for now we do it all online and do curbside pickup whenever possible.