Tales from the Water Cooler: Bottle sniffers are far worse than carrot fascists

 

Donald Macinnes
Friday 13 December 2013 20:15 GMT
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British households threw away 7.2 million tons of food in 2011
British households threw away 7.2 million tons of food in 2011

I shop at Tesco. I tell you this not in a crass effort to get a tenner off my next shop, but to illustrate that I am quite close to the story about which I shall now ruminate. (Anyway, I shop at Tesco because it is closest to my house. As far as I’m concerned, an aisle is an aisle is an aisle, however it is branded.)

This week said übermarket announced it was sick of its customers being so picky about the aesthetic appeal of its fruit and vegetables. Seems far too much fresh produce is being binned because, frankly, no one wants nobbly carrots in their stew. Personally, I couldn’t care less what shape my spuds are. But Tesco is determined to educate those of us who select only the most photogenic melons, by pricing down the ugly stuff and encouraging us to be less produce-fascist.

Fair enough. But what concerns me more is people who sniff stuff. I was in Tesco yesterday, looking for some shower gel (something vigorous enough to cut through my natural odours, but not too masculine that my wife can use it without smelling like Wayne Rooney’s jogging bottoms). In front of me a woman was going along the rows of gels, popping the caps and having a good sniff of the contents. This to me is WAY worse than carrot elitism. I don’t mind if my grapes have been pre-squeezed, but I’d rather you kept your nose out of my Imperial Leather.

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