Yesterday, I finally went back to my old HEB to see what the store was like now that the huge rebuilding/remodeling project is finished. Lin had stopped by there a few weeks ago, and he said he hated it, but I had to go see for myself.

Well … I hate it too.

Sure, it’s all clean and newly painted and has all new fixtures, but the actual experience of trying to buy groceries there is awful. The general layout of the place is unlike any other grocery store. Cheeses, instead of being in the dairy area are sprinkled here and there. I never did find the bags of grated cheeses. Maybe they don’t even have any. Canned vegetables, likewise, are also not all in one place. I’m sure they sell toilet paper and paper towels, but I never happened across them. These are just examples. I could go on.

When I did find the things I had on my list, I found they had at most two or three varieties/brands available, and those brands tended to be the worst, cheapest, and least healthy options. It’s a store practically stocked entirely with generic brands. And don’t ask me about the coffee selection. I wasn’t expecting to find fair trade organic whole beans imported from around the world, but I would have been happy to find a bag of Starbucks (and I hate Starbucks coffee).

The lack of variety and selection extended to the produce department as well. There were two kinds of tomatoes. Large round ones and small Romas. There were NO cherry tomatoes of any kind. None. I have shopped in a lot of little grocery stores and odd shops selling food, and well … even convenience stores have some kind of cherry tomato. It wasn’t just cherry tomatoes that we’re missing. The produce department took up a ton of space, but it barely had anything in it. Just piles and piles of a few things.

I can’t even bring myself to talk about the meat department. All I’ll say is … large plexiglass bins full of preseasoned chicken parts and scoops. The rest is best left to your imagination.

Checking out went more quickly than ever. They had more than two registers open for a change, and that was nice. The experience of not being able to find what I needed (because who knows where it might be hidden, if they even had it), the low quality of nearly all the products I did find, and the fact I know I spent more for less product, has left me sad. The store is even less useful than it was before they remodeled and modernized it. It’s a shame the store closest to my home sucks so badly.

I’m even more sad for the people who have to shop there. I have options. I can get in the truck and drive to Tech Ridge or anywhere else to find the items I want, but I remember what it was like when I wasn’t so blessed. Back when I was walking or riding the bus to get groceries, had I been stuck shopping at a store like this newly remade HEB, my diet would have been total crap by default, because there wouldn’t have been any choice. So I’m a little sad for myself that my neighborhood store is so awful, but mostly, I’m sad for the rest of the people in my ‘hood who have no options other than shopping at that crappy, crappy store full of overpriced less-than-nutritious crap.

I won’t be going back. I’d hoped at the very least it would be a place I could go to pick up basic items when I didn’t feel like going to Tech Ridge, but it’s not even going to be good for that. I wouldn’t even plunder that store in the event of a zombie apocalypse.