Safer ways to get your groceries during the COVID-19 pandemic

The pros and cons of grocery pickup and delivery

Ordering groceries online
Many stores, including Walmart, have online ordering services that will let you pay online and either have your groceries brought to your door or allow you to pick them up.

The delivery option isn’t available everywhere. In fact, the delivery option is most often available in more populated cities while the grocery pickup option seems better suited and more available in rural areas.

The way it works at Walmart is you select a pickup time when placing your order online. You drive to the location and enter a pickup lane, where you lean out your driver’s side window to sign in at a kiosk (have some sanitizer in your car to clean your hands afterward).

If you can pop your trunk from your front seat, you never even have to leave your car. An employee will open it and load your groceries. The only interaction with them is providing a “finger” signature on a tablet device (again, you’ll want to use your hand sanitizer after this) when they walk around to your window.

The pros: You don’t have to set foot in a store and be around other people and their germs. You can order what you want, pay for it online and not handle cash. It’s simple to use.

Or, at the very worst, depending on the store, you may have to enter the store to pick up your groceries, but won’t have to spend time in the aisles with other people.

Amazon Fresh: Groceries delivered right to your door. Free delivery with Amazon Prime.

The cons: When ordering this way, you are still at the mercy of supply and demand. But if, for example, Walmart is out of an item at the time you are placing your order, the online system is capable of alerting you so you can order a different brand.

Also, you may not get the produce you’d normally choose. I know for me, for example, picking my own produce is important. How will they know how I like my bananas or tomatoes? Will they be ripe? How long will they last once they’re in my home?

The supermarket chain I use here in Maine, charges a $5 fee for the “to go” service, after your first order. And, I’d need to stick to the window of time given me for pickup of my groceries.

Walmart, however, does not charge a fee for pickup.

After you get home and unload your groceries, throw away the sacks and soap up your hands well.

Read: This is how long coronavirus lives in the air and on surfaces