No, the flour is fine, really!

[LillFilly]

Grabbed some groceries last night. Was having fun chatting with the cashier and bagger, when suddenly the bagger goes "OMGI'msosorryi'msoclumsyOMGI'llgetyouanewone! " She'd picked up the bag of flour and the top flap had ripped; just an inch or so so you could see the flour. She looked so scared! I told her it'd be fine if she just wrapped it in another plastic bag. She looked shocked and said "really!?" I said yeah, it was just flour and I was using it tomorrow anyway. She seemed so relieved, but it was sad, like she was a puppy that had been kicked one too many times.

[dragon_wings]

I think you may have made her night.

[MoonCat]

Y'know, I never understood why the cashiers would get so worried when something I put on the belt ripped a little. "Are you sure you don't want a new one? Are you SURE?"

Now I understand it's because some people apparently throw a huge fit over stuff like that. And isn't that sad?

[Dreamstalker]

One of my pet peeves as a bagger are the flour/sugar bags; there's no easy way to pick them up quickly without feeling like it's going to rip open (and if I am being careful, my hands can run a risk of getting squashed by an overzealous cashier flinging stuff down the belt).

I was running returns the other day and someone had put a bag of sugar with a hole in it to be reshelved (damaged items are supposed to be tied up in a plastic bag right away). Said hole wasn't obvious unless you picked the bag up "correctly"...whoever put it in the cart had to notice.

[DGoddessChardonnay]

We have that issue quite a bit with the bags too . . . if it's not flour, it's sugar, cornmeal or grits.

It's basically a simple reason: the paper used to make the packaging is very thin and they (manufacturers) don't think to encase the product into a cellophane packaging (like you would see cake mix enclosed in inside the cardboard box.) I have trouble picking up those bags w/out half the time poking a hole into one accidentally due to my nails (and the fact that the paper is tissue thin almost so it gives way with little pressure applied.)

Perhaps that might be a good suggestion to pass on to the manufacturers?

[Beki710]

Worse one I had was when a customer picked up a huge bag of kitty litter and dumped it onto the belt, the bottom just burst and there was cat litter everywhere, went down the belt mechanics and everything... Were they reasonable about being moved to another till? Of course not, that wasn't their fault at all...

[Kal]

I've had bad luck with cat litter recently. A few months ago I picked one up in a shop, got halfway down the aisle before I noticed I was leaving a trail behind me (and yes, I did tell someone about it and apologise for the mess).
Then just last week I made a quick trip out shopping, put two bags of food and a cat litter on the passenger seat of my car and then tried to get them out via the drivers side door (not on the roadside you see). It would have worked if the bottom seam hadn't chosen that moment to open on the cat litter bag, spreading grit all over the gear lever, handbrake, drivers seat and footwell (I still have bits of cat litter there as it really doesn't like to be hoovered up). On the bright side, my car's now odour free and non clumping.

[Sleepwalker]

I always rather liked how sugar and flour are some of the last foods not to be shrinkwrapped.

Of course, I don't work in a grocery store cleaning up after morons who burst the bags.

[Kristev]

Try cleaning up a trail that goes through the entire store, and people won't stay out of it. Fun.

Sugar is the worst, but flower's a close second.

[Bella_Vixen]

This happens quite often at work. 99% of the time, the customer is willing to keep the open bag, since they plan on using it right away anyway.

I'm still trying to figure out just what one customer was thinking when they bought a bag of flour off our discount table that was sealed with duct tape.* I happen to know that that particular bag of flour had been kept on the damaged rack, untaped, for a few days, before it was marked down. Flour is something you shouldn't mess with.

*OK, I know what they were thinking; they wanted to save money. But still.

[Ironclad Alibi]

I'm still trying to figure out just what one customer was thinking when they bought a bag of flour off our discount table that was sealed with duct tape.* I happen to know that that particular bag of flour had been kept on the damaged rack, untaped, for a few days, before it was marked down. Flour is something you shouldn't mess with.

Perhaps they intended to make a "special" treat for a very "special" friend.

[EricKei]

I always figured baggers/cashiers were paranoid about holes in bags due to SC's who will raise an absolute SHIT fit about them : "Whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaat?! You are trying to poison me! The bag is open so the whole batch must be bad! You need to go back there RIGHT NOW and throw out the entire shipment! I'll bet this one is full of weevils AAAAAAAAAAAAAAA"