First there was the regular sized grocery cart. Well not actually the first, that was really a folding basket carrier patented in 1948, let’s say original modern shopping cart. Next probably came those small plastic hand baskets, perfect for those 10 items or less shoppers.
The next variation was the ones that have a slightly smaller basket which sacrifice grocery space for a plastic toy car in front to place the kiddies.
When our newest Kroger opened up 5 years ago or so there was another choice added, a 25% larger basket (mostly in width) for those big family bi-weekly shopping trips. The new store was more brightly lit to enhance the shopping experience and had slightly wider aisles, coincidentally about 25% wider.
A couple years later these small carts appeared that had a shelf for those small plastic baskets, which in a strange way almost returned the cart to it’s humble roots and allowed those to lazy to actually have to carry those ten items.
On a quick trip to the store this evening I noticed a 6th different kind of cart sharing the abandoned in the parking lot experience with its brethren, sort of a hybrid between the small cart with shelf and a regular cart. It looked like a plastic basket cart with a wire basket about a third of the size of a regular cart permanently attached.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 412