Do Aldis in the U.S. bag your groceries? In Ireland, you would have to bring your own bags, or buy their thick plastic ones. And then the cashier would tut-tut you if you took too long bagging your own groceries.
You bag your own. Generally the cashier puts the scanned items in an empty cart sitting there for that purpose, then you swap your empty cart for the one with your purchases in it and wheel it over to a counter against the wall to bag or box them up - at the counter there is a stockpile of empty boxes that you can take.
You do have to bag your own. Or buy paper or plastic. You also have the option to pick up empty cardboard boxes or bring your own bags.
Oddly, here in Noway, you nearly always bag your own groceries regardless of the chain. You pay a little for plastic bags, which are always decent quality. Most people turn around and use those bags for their household trash.
I have gotten much faster at bagging groceries since I've lived here. I have never really had a cashier tut-tut at me for being too slow: but the bagging are is divided into 2 sections and sometimes they won't switch back to my side. There is some social pressure to be quick about it, but folks seem to understand if one has a lot of groceries.
You bag the groceries yourself in the U.S. too. The cashier puts them in a shopping cart which you take to a nearby long counter where you bag them. (They charge for bags but sometimes there are empty cardboard shipping boxes at the counter that you can use.)
It's the same here in the U.S, bring your own or buy their plastic reusable ones. The locations I've been too sometimes had spare boxes you could use, but that was pretty rare.
Aldi has no problem with you reshuffling the stock on the shelf to create an 'empty' box out of two partially filled ones. I've gotten really good at this.
When you think about it, it also keeps the shelves a bit more organized when people are walking away with the cardboard that would normally have to be recovered and packed up by the employees.
Yes. We bag on our own. Also we have to deposit a quarter to use the shopping cart. And it seems these stores have only 2 or 3 employees at any given time.
