Always Use A Shopping Cart

[Crash]

If you're at your local supermarket, big-box store, etc., recommend you always use a shopping cart, even if you're buying only a couple of small items. This has several purposes:

1 If you're carrying openly, it will prevent somebody in front of you from grabbing your gun as easily as they might otherwise have.
2 If you're carry concealed, as in AIWB, and you're afraid you might be printing, it will make it harder to see the outline of your gun.
3. If someone in front of you attempts to attack you, you can roll or shove the cart into them, giving you more time to retreat or draw your gun, whichever is most appropriate.

Comments?

Crash

[OneGun]

What about someone attacking you from behind? I would expect a rear attack If I had a cart because I am more vulnerable from behind. Also, a cart makes me look forward more than behind.

I do not like to have to tend to a cart if I only have one or two items. Yet, again, I like to go in, purchase and leave a store. A cart slows me down.

[TreyHouston]

Agreed! Both hands are typically on the cart in front of you instead of by your side...

[mojo84]

Solution looking for problem.

[Crash]

I understand that an attack from behind is probably more likely than one from the front, but it should have been pretty apparent that my statements applied only to confrontations with someone in front of you.

I carry AIWB, so I can probably get to my gun just as quickly from the shopping cart as I can if my hands were down at my side. I also carry AIWB when I'm driving, so I'm used to having to move my hands down to get to the gun. In fact, I can get to it quicker from the shopping cart than I can from the steering wheel.

And this technique probably wouldn't help if one carries openly, but I don't.

As far as not being properly dressed to conceal my weapon, au contraire, Pierre. I wear a shirt that is at least one size bigger than my normal size, outside my pants, and I always wear one that is a plaid or some other pattern that helps conceal the gun. BUT, that doesn't mean it won't ever happen, so I like to hedge my bets.

A solution looking for a problem? Not at all--I just like to consider all possibilities and have a solution for as many problems as I can.

As always, to each his own.....

Crash

[montgomery]

If you're at your local supermarket, big-box store, etc., recommend you always use a shopping cart, even if you're buying only a couple of small items. This has several purposes:

1 If you're carrying openly, it will prevent somebody in front of you from grabbing your gun as easily as they might otherwise have.
2 If you're carry concealed, as in AIWB, and you're afraid you might be printing, it will make it harder to see the outline of your gun.
3. If someone in front of you attempts to attack you, you can roll or shove the cart into them, giving you more time to retreat or draw your gun, whichever is most appropriate.

Comments?

Crash

Who, exactly, recommends this shopping cart tactic? If we are going down this path, the motorized scooter is probably the best path - you get a basket plus a getaway vehicle that enables one to quickly access their ankle rig while still moving.

[Jusme]

I don't always, get a cart, but I at least get a small basket, because if I get more than one item, it requires me to occupy my gun hand. I can carry the basket in my left hand, and it is a great distraction/semi-weapon, in the event, that I am suddenly accosted. I try to be tactically aware, everywhere I go, I scan for exits, avoid choke points, watch people, and use reflective surfaces, to see behind me. I generally have to do these things for more than one person, because, my wife and son, get tunnel vision, when shopping. I realize, the odds, of being attacked, are slim, especially, in a large grocery, or box store, but it helps me keep my SA sharp, to practice. JMHO

[chasfm11]

Here are some other considerations for me:

1. I believe that the areas for most concern in big box and supermarkets are the parking lots, not the interiors of the stores themselves. John, from Active Self Protection calls them "transitional spaces". As others have suggested, I want the fewest things possible in my hands in those parts of the store environment.
2. In line with the parking lot being an area of concern, one of the tactics that I've seen recommended is to never walk directly to your car upon your return. Typically, I park out further, where all sides of my car are visible. It is rare that someone parks beside me in those places and, when it happens, my extra SA is turned on. Instead of walking down an alley toward my parking spot, I walk down the alley on either side and cut across only when I get close. Someone following me in a car is not going to be able to get close to me as I go to enter my vehicle. In many cases, other cards and concrete bumpers or curbs separate the corridors and a shopping cart, especially an unnecessary one based on purchases made, is a hindrance, not an asset to me.
3. There have been some articles talking about how the manner in which you would can attract or deter someone looking for a quick score. Someone who walks confidently and briskly is less of a target than someone who is slower and more hesitant, according to those articles. One of the reasons that I park out is to give myself the time for the extra exercise and I try to walk briskly. A shopping cart that isn't needed for my purchases takes away from that. Too many of them have bad wheels and are hard to steer.

4. I believe that the safest practice is to go to my car, get in and leave without hesitation. I'm the sort who will always return a cart that I use to the cart racks as a courtesy to others. I don't like my doors banged by runaway cards and won't want to be responsible for that happening to someone else. My movement (with the empty cart while return it to the cart rack) is very predictable. I don't like to be predictable.

When I need a cart, I use one but am aware that it can slow me down in normal movements.

That's my $.02 worth.

[twomillenium]

Solution looking for problem.

[Lynyrd]

I'm not a germophobe, but shopping cart handles are about the nastiest thing you can encounter. I don't use them unless absolutely necessary.

http://www.foxnews.com/lifestyle/2013/0 ... -cart.html

A study of 85 random shopping carts conducted by Dr. Charles P. Gerba found that 50 percent carried E. coli, while 72 percent contained coliform bacteria. "The exceptionally high level of coliform bacteria suggests that fecal material may be involved in cart contamination," the report further stated.

Duberg cites Gerba's findings for the answer: "[There are] 138,00 total bacteria per square inch of a shopping cart — an amount which exceeds the number of bacteria in the average public restroom," she says. "These are fecal bacteria capable of causing illness."

[WTR]

I read you should never put food in the fold down seat of a shopping cart, that is wear diapered baby butts go.

[JustSomeOldGuy]

I read you should never put food in the fold down seat of a shopping cart, that is wear diapered baby butts go.

Daily steam cleaning (the carts, not the kids) would take care of that.....

[PriestTheRunner]

...

...

No. Nononono. You want the Assault Wheelbarrow. And to be able to hold off the aggressors about to breach the entrance at The Gap.
http://lonelymachines.org/mall-ninjas/
https://www.northeastshooters.com/xen/t ... ps.311818/

This may have been the greatest hour wasted of my life.

Many thanks for the link LOL!