H-E-B — Attraction in McKinney

Would give a 0 rating if possible. Would recommend management to fire Linda and to train employees how to actual spot a thief. Was at self checkout and was going a little too fast so the system didn’t register the Thomas bagels placed in the bag. It prompted for a worker to put their thumbprint and code I proceeded to alert the worker and showed her the bagels. I had 19 items, they all didn’t fit on the small table with two bag sections. I decided to EMPTY MY CART and start placing the full bags in my cart. Mind you I do this all the time at Walmart, Kroger, Tom Thumb, Target. Linda proceeded to ride my behind and just stand there watching and scolding me. I ignored because I’m not doing anything wrong. The machine prompts that I need to stop removing the bags to scan an item. Linda proceeds to give me attitude to explain the situation. I then needed to scan my soda and the bottom of the cart was in the way so the machine again prompted for Linda’s magic password. Again not an issue, typical to experience delays with machines at self check out. Tell me why when I went to call Linda to put her password she says “what is it now” with attitude. In what world is it ever okay to say that statement to a customer who actual needs help. Great customer service HEB. Not sure what she expected me to do when she needed to fix the machine so that I can pay. I ignored her comment instead of replying and paid for items. As soon as I was about to step foot out of the the carts wheels locked up and the alarms started sounding. Funny thing is no one even came and I was stuck waiting for 5 mins till Catina came and told me I’m good to go and rated my cart “stalled” bc I wasn’t in self check out for long. Which doesn’t make sense bc I was in line for over 5 mins scanning items plus the delays for waiting for Assistance. Y’all have cameras and can check the time stamp. No further explanation was given. Everyone else was able to gracefully leave the store while my cart was the only one locked up. She proceeded to go giggle to Linda and Linda left her spot and went somewhere. I went ahead and decided this location didn’t deserve my money. I may look like a child but don’t profile thinking I’m not paying for my items. I made Catina return my $60 items as well as offered her to search me and my siblings and the bags bc we didn’t do anything wrong but she denied. A fun quick grocery trip turned to en event of embarrassment due to an employee thinking a 16 old kid who’s actually 25 couldn’t possible be correctly purchasing such items at 9 Pm. Hire more people to help assist with checkout if the market doesn’t trust it’s customers to use self checkout for there items or use clear camera systems to properly detect people that’s actual stealing or not correctly scanning items. Catina could’ve apologized but seemed disinterested. She needs to find a job she actual enjoys. They give HEB a trashy appearance, and I was better off shopping at Kroger across the street from the beginning. HEB lost my money that night and across the street gained it...

Unfortunately I don't have accurate photos representing the establishment, YET. There's always way too many people walking around, and it's very crowded. Once it dies down I can get some aisle shots. Instead, I'll make this as detailed as possible.

The building itself is huge. It's about the size of one and a half Wal-Mart Supercenters. There's a BBQ joint catered to the ones who are looking for a quick pick-me-up. I'll be able to try that soon and update how I feel about it.

-The aisles are very clearly marked, and easy to find your way around after a couple times through the whole thing. There is SUCH a HUGE variety of things that I'm speechless that I've not actually been able to see the entire store the first few times going. It's just that much ! -There's a sushi bar which depicts very fresh sushi, and each container marks the exact time it was made. I've never been able to see that from other stores. -The bakery has a nice selection of pies, cakes, cookies, and even macarons. Most everything in the store is quite affordable. -The meat market even has aged meats drying in a cooler rack. Something I definitely don't see everyday. -The entire store has coupons hanging from various items. Each item shows the exact price you pay after a coupon has been utilized. I'm hoping they don't do away with the idea, because it does seem like a fun way to save money, even if it can be quite time consuming for the staff. -The HEB brands are quite affordable and delicious. We got the muenster cheese from the same brand, and I kid you not, the best cheese I've had in a long time. We ate it all in 2 days. -They even have a chef cooking pizzas near the produce section. I'm really curious to try those. -Everything looks super fresh and I like the samples they give, because it's not something you'd eat everyday. Today they had a spicy jelly on cream cheese, and it was wonderful. -Its a one stop shop, so they've also got home goods, toys, healthcare, makeup products, candles, cookware and most likely tons more things I have yet to find. -There's even a barrage of plants outside near the front entrance.

Overall I'm excited to see what else I can find there. Usually it's hard for us to find new foods to try as of late, but with everything laid out so well here, it should...

Update: My first trip to HEB (review below) was not very enjoyable, but after a week of trying the HEB branded products (pasta, cereal, salsa, etc.) purchased during the first visit, I can admit that the taste and quality of the food products were indeed better and more distinctive than those found in other stores. For that reason, I decided to give another shot, this time earlier in the afternoon. Unfortunately, my shopping experience was similar this time as well - long lines, clogged aisles, and overall slow movement through a huge store. Basically, you need to plan a couple of hours to shop here. For specific feedback to the store, I noticed that the carts are too wide for the aisles so it's difficult to have two carts in opposite directions in one aisle. Furthermore, there are support columns in each aisle, blocking the way for the big carts and that adds to the clogging. In their attempt to help, shoppers sometimes "park" their carts on one side of the aisle while browsing products on the other side - this unfortunately ends up blocking the whole aisle for the people behind them. So the slowest folk in the store form the bottleneck. I am not sure if the size of the carts and the resulting slow traffic is intentional, but if not it will help immensely if the carts are narrower than what they are today. As grocery shopping experiences go, my first (and possibly last) visit to HEB was not enjoyable. The store is too big, and at least on that day, it was too crowded for comfort. Finding specific items was not super intuitive and it was exhausting to crawl along from one end of the store to the other between shoppers hauling huge shopping carts. I had heard that HEB carries unique products and had been long curious to find out more. While there were a few distinctive sauces and cereals that I found, I would rather make separate visits to Target for groceries and Trader Joes or Sprouts for different items on occasion. All of these stores are significantly less expensive than HEB and in many cases, these are the same branded items that HEB carries as well. All in all, I do not see the point of going back there anytime soon. Perhaps if I am missing a different type of salsa, I might go back in...