It has become customary to bag your own groceries now. How do you bag your purchases? I suppose the common sense thing to do is to put heavier things at the bottom, and put the soft, delicate items such as bread, strawberries, eggs and tofu at the top. However, do you sort your bags by your storage area?
There are two recommendations I have when bagging your groceries:
- sort the items with your storage area in mind
- do it at the trunk of your car
Sort Groceries by Storage Area
Start with preparing separate bags/containers for each storage area or purpose. Then, sort your purchases by what you will do with them when you get home.
For example:
- Frozen items (in a cooler box or insulated bag)
- Refrigerated items (in an insulated bag)
- Fruits & vegetables
- Pantry items
- Prepared foods to be consumed immediately
- Non-food items, such as cleaning supplies
This will help you to prioritize the tasks of putting these away when you arrive home. Those helping you to carry the bags from the car inside can also easily understand what needs to be done first.
For example:
| Items | Task After Arrival | Priority |
| Frozen items | Store in freezer | Very high |
| Refrigerated items | Store in refrigerator | High |
| Fruits & vegetables | Wash then prepare for storage | Medium |
| Prepared foods | Prepare to eat | High |
| Pantry items | Store in pantry | Low |
| Non-food items | Store in pantry/laundry | Low |
This helps manage time when you arrive home so that you don’t need to store everything upon arrival, but only the items that have a high priority. You can work on putting away the pantry items after you catch your breath — perhaps munch on some prepared foods, such as a cake with coffee! If you have multiple pantry areas (e.g. cupboard for immediate use, pantry room for long-term storage), then separating by these two areas is encouraged as well.
This also helps to prevent “accidents” where for example a melted ice cream is found sitting in the heat.
Bag Groceries at the Trunk of Your Car
When possible, take your purchases in your shopping cart and go directly to your car. You will have much more space and privacy than the crowded area near the cashier where everyone bags their groceries. If you have brought a large cooler box, then you can put your purchases in your trunk much more easily.
There are some parking lots that do not allow you to take the shopping carts into the parking lot area. From experience, these are rare and have other parking areas within the same shopping complex that do allow it, so try to look around.
It doesn’t take much more effort to follow these two recommendations, and is so much more convenient once you get home!
