Big Y — Local services in Lee

It’s a nice immaculate store with great quality food. Not too huge that you can’t find things. It is pricey compared to stop n shop and price chopper and others. And since the local price chopper closed nearby seems like prices have crept up some. But still reasonable when considering quality And factoring in the need to drive to pittsfield or great Barrington for other options. However there is one thing that just annoys me! You can’t get a bag for your groceries without paying for it! Yes I know Lee has a ban on plastic bags. Stupid local ordinance that is liberal nonsense. Nothing management can do about that. But before the plastic bag ban this store always gave a choice of paper or plastic bags, included for free to shoppers. Now they charge 25 cents per paper bag! It appears the store decided to really take advantage in switching to selling bags where they used to give even the paper bags away to each of their paying customers. And to make matters worse, the paper bags they sell you rip every time by the time you get to your car! Lift the handles, it rips from the top. Lift at the bottom, the groceries punch through the side. I think they are actually designed to rip as if you look at them theY are this really cheap paper and the top edges are serrated giving the bag every opportunity to rip! Yes you can use the reusable bags. I don’t like them. They get dirty and start to smell. So I buy the bags they have. But last 2 weeks now my groceries have fallen apart in the parking lot. Tonight the bag falling apart caused my $9.00 worth of blueberries to dump in the parking lot. Just nonsense that a grocery store won’t give a customer a decent bag for their groceries. Makes me want to shop elsewhere.

Updated. Last night went in. 9:00. Just needed a couple things for camping trip. Figured a quick in an out. Lines on both staffed isles all the way up into the isles. No help. Auto checkout was open but not staffed. Poor woman stuck at the automatic checkout waiting as the machine said “wait for assistance” over and over and over. I walked over to the two staffed lanes tried to get help for her and was told there was no one assigned to the automatic checkouts that could help her out. So this poor woman just had to stand there. her order was part rung up and she was afraid her card was going to be charged wrong. No one at the service desk either. After 15 minutes she just gave up and left. The two employees at the other lanes looked over on occasion. I tried to help her but could not. So I finished ringing up my groceries and threw them back into the cart, since they won’t give you a damn bag in this store, and left. Whoever the manager of this store is must be an complete idiot. No staff on a Friday night? No staff assigned on the auto checkouts? No one that can help at the auto checkouts? And of course the damn paper bags designed to fail just after you walk out the door. But don’t worry. They will happily charge you a quarter for each one of those bags. I’ve gone from loving this store when it opened, to being annoyed with things in this store, to disliking this store, to hating it - in the span of about a year. Sure is going down hill fast since their...

We stopped at this store on our way home from a few days away. Therefore, I'm only basing this on one visit. I was not impressed with this store at all.

The store itself was crowded with displays in aisles that made it very difficult to navigate. It was also jammed pack with product that looked dingy and dusty. The store itself was dirty; not just the floors with tracking from the slush outside, but a layer of grime on everything that stopped us from buying any food that couldn't be washed or wasn't packaged completely.

That said, we bought creamer, bagged spinach, apples, bread and holiday peeps (I love them so don't judge.) The creamer was fine. The bagged spinach was already wilting when I opened it and I had to toss it the next day due to spoilage. The apples were mealy, the bread was stale and my peeps were already hard! I was totally disgusted.

The one bright spot from the entire experience was our cashier. She was friendly and helpful. She also packed my bags correctly which I always appreciate. She deserves 5 stars, unfortunately the store itself...

I was extremely distressed that patrons without masks are permitted to shop in spite of the order from Tri-Town Health mandating masks with no exceptions. I made a special trip to shop in Lee because of the safety of this mask mandate. I was told by the cashier that it was because the manager said they couldn't enforce this mandate because of hipaa. Hippa is intended to protect a person's medical privacy. "The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA) is a federal law that required the creation of national standards to protect sensitive patient health information from being disclosed without the patient's consent or knowledge." This mandate from Tri-Town merely says "no exceptions". No one needs to ask about anyone's medical history. It's simple -- No...