Grocery Outlet — Attraction in Santa Barbara

The only reason I don’t give 5 stars is that I’m not usually impressed with the produce. It’s not bad or anything, it just doesn’t seem as fresh as I prefer my produce to be. It can be hard to preplan your trip because they don’t carry certain items consistently. That’s just the nature of the store and probably why it’s so much cheaper than the other grocery stores! However, I always go when I have extra time to browse because I love finding new items that you’d not really think about. They always have outstanding deals on seasonal items which is my favorite part! I buy my hair products here because I need high end products that are usually way to expensive for me to buy and extremely frustrating. They have a very large selection of really good quality hair products that keeps me happy every trip I make to this store! The employees are unusually friendly which I find is so rare now days! Please please keep the nice employees around! I can’t take many more rude encounters I endure at the other stores I’m forced to visit. Parking is plentiful, hours of operation are good (except if you say you close at 10 I expect to be let in even at 9:55 to grab something I may really need. It’s happened several times I show up with 15 - 20 minutes before 10 and the door is locked. Close when you want just stay true to your posted hours so I don’t waste my time. Very much appreciated!). Definitely worth coming to shop at...

Fantastic store, I shop here for 3/4 of my groceries.

Prices: Lots of great deals if you pay attention and know your average prices for things. Not everything is on sale, but most is reasonably priced and then on top of that I've found temporary deals better than anywhere else. Example: American cheese slices for $0.60/lb. I think it's based on what has reached the sell-by date, or discontinued products. I "shop here first" then fill in the blanks with a Costco run.

Selection: Some products are a one-time deal, other basic items are consistently stocked. Good natural foods and fresh produce selection, though you have to be mindful of produce as some is bad or going to rot quickly.

Staff and practices: Staff are typically kind and in a good mood, it seems they are well-staffed and I've only seen 4+ people in line a couple of times. The store does a raffle for free groceries (though the app is a bit buggy and won't enter my receipts for some reason), and right now doing a drive to donate food to Unity Shoppe for those experiencing food scarcity. Your $5 donation gets you $5 off your next $25+ trip. I also think it's great when they offer super low price deals that they are obviously not making a ton of money if any on, but they would rather see people get the food for next to nothing, than throw it into a locked dumpster like...

Love going here and buying something weird. There are lots of healthy options, and strange ones, too, products that were somehow approved to go to market but could never really sell well in stores (think, for example, banana chocolate milk or orange cream toaster pastries.) Some of these unique combinations of food end up being really tasty, like the blueberry vanilla goat cheese (similar to what Trader Joe's sells.) I almost always end up trying a new bottle of wine that catches my eye or a beer I haven't tried, too. The selection is good and always changing.

Many will say that they avoid the produce and meat, but I've never had problems. I did once buy some hamburger buns for a BBQ. A day later at the BBQ our host noticed the buns were moldy. A little embarrassing for me. I guess I should have checked myself at the store. I would guess that this sort of experience is rare. I've shopped here and at other Grocery Outlet locations many times and never had any...