S/O Target/Walmart etc. what drives you to shop?

I'll be super honest, 98% of the time it's lower prices. I work hard for my money and I want to get the best bang for my buck.

I rarely go out to shop any more except for groceries--I'm an online person. But when I did, ambiance as well as price is a big factor. Pushing a shopping cart through boxes is not my idea of a good time.

Quality, variety and price. I feel lucky to be able to say that.

Convenience and reliability. I work full-time and have a lot of kids in a lot of activities. I do not have the bandwith to run to a second store if a first store doesn’t have what I need, or to drive to a far-off location.

Part convenience, part shopping experience.

We do a lot of shopping at Costco for bulk items.

For regular shopping, I shop at the big grocery store in town. It is brand new and beautiful. I have the rewards card and get cents off gas. They have a huge variety.

I do not buy groceries and Target or Walmart. Target is a drive for me so I rarely shop there.

quality and being close.. I shop 4 different stores all near by and know what I want to get where. I do like shopping the smaller fancy store near by as I can just drop in and out fast.

I don't shop target for food or go to costco.. and walmart does not exist nearby

For me it's cost. Being a smart shopper was ingrained at an early age. Our Walmart is huge (I guess that's a Super Walmart ) and the only thing I don't buy is produce. I split between WM, TJ and Raley's. Raley's digital coupons save a lot of money. Yesterday I got a 5-lb bag of potatoes for 97¢. Coffeemate creamer for under $3. When I buy at WM, I probably save an average of $10-$20. Over a year, that adds up.

The convenience of porch delivery is right up there with cost savings. I do sometimes have to complain about how items are bagged resulting in crushed bread or chips, etc. I am always refunded for any type of discrepancies. I have been using Walmart Plus since the early days of Covid. I have continued due to medical issues.

When I need something. I don’t shop much, but when I do, I tend to buy a lot. I don’t enjoy shopping, so I only go when I need to get a gift, or replace something.


^^^This is referring to cosmetics, clothes, shoes, etc. I do grocery shopping every week in person. I go to Marc’s first, and then to the grocery store (Giant Eagle or Meier) for some stuff, like deli products, yogurt, etc.

Traffic here sucks, so my first thought is convenience of getting in and out and do they have everything I need.

Target costs more AND they have more things I like, which equals expensive trips, and I mainly avoid it.

I rarely go to Walmart but it can be a good place to pick up a variety of things I might need, in only one trip.

I am also ridiculously cheap about certain things and not others, I absolutely admit it makes no sense but I drive past Kroger and Publix about a mile from my house to go all the way to Aldi to save money. There are only a few things I have to have the brand names of. So in that case, it's money.




ETA I don't really care about the "shopping experience" since I'm going to hate it no matter what. I do like the Aldi Aisle of Shame surprises though, and during the weekday they're usually not too busy. Unlike Trader Joe's, which is almost as much my idea of Hell as IKEA is. Followed by Costco. Necessary at times but overall avoided most of the year.

I'm a Publix shopper. Our local-ish choices for groceries are Earth Fare, Food Lion, Harris Teeter, Lowes Foods, Dollar General, and Walmart (although that was flooded by Hurricane Helene and hasn't reopened yet). Most of those stores are closer to me than Publix, but I prefer the cleanliness of Publix and their employees are friendly. If you shop the BOGOs, they are often cheaper than the cheap stores, plus they often have a gas card deal once a month or so (if you spend $50 on groceries, you can get a $50 gas gift card for $40).

I do like to buy chicken and steak at Earth Fare on Tuesdays, as boneless chicken breast is $3.99 pound on Tuesdays and their meat quality is good.

For paper goods and stuff like detergent, I stock up at Sams or Costco when we go to Winston-Salem with the dogs every 4 or so weeks.

Yes!  I hate that I "have" to shop at Home Depot but my only other option is Lowes which is miles away.  It's just not easy to haul lumber in my rickety old van from further away when HD is right down the street.

After reading the other posts,  I realized convenience is also a huge factor in where I shop.

I don't do a ton of in person shopping anymore. I live in Target country with plenty of SuperTargets. I pay $60 a year and have my groceries and household items delivered. It is THE best service ever.

For in person shopping, I want clean, bright stores. Unclutter aisles. Amble checkout lanes. I will gladly pay a bit more for tidy shelve where product is removed from cardboard flats and there aren't pallets of stuff everywhere. I find Walmart to be an incredibly stressful place to shop. The tend to be dirty, more spoiled food than other stores and the layouts make zero sense to me. If they could remove 1/3 of their skus and move the damn pallets everywhere, I would gladly shop there more often. I also find Costco to be a stressful place to shop, many of the same reasons as Walmart.

We have an Ace hardware in our town that my husband frequents, I'm trying to dissuade him, though the store is owned by a local family. Home Depot is the next closest, Lowe's is more inconvenient. But we are trying to make the effort to shop there vs Ace/HD.

My biggest issue right now is prescriptions. I hate going in stores. CVS recently changed their pharmacy hours from 10 AM-5PM, closed on weekends. MADNESS. Anywhere else I have to go into the store.

Convivence is important to me, but it means I've relied too heavily on Amazon prime. We are not in the process of breaking up with Amazon and cutting prime.

Mostly I shop based on price and convenience. For example Target, Costco and other big box stores are about half an hour away so even if the prices are right I am not interested in going there on a regular basis. I mostly shop within my neighborhood as I can get whatever I want.