A short leash for shopping carts: February is the month to return them to the store

Besides being the second month of the year, February is host to Solo Diners Eat Out Week, Bubble Gum Day, National Condom Week and National Chili Day.

But another designation perhaps lower on the radar is February being Return Shopping Carts to the Supermarket Month.

Criminally minded or not, thieves walk away with an estimated $180 million in shopping carts annually, according to a 2000 report from the Food Marketing Institute. A daily loss of two carts would create a $73,000 loss per year for a supermarket, the report estimated.

Richard Bennett, a manger at Rite Aid along Al Tahoe Boulevard, said the store needs to replace 40 to 50 carts per year for a variety of reasons. Bennett said he drives around town looking for wayward carts. Each of the carts costs $90.

"It is a small problem," he said. "We find them as far as the 'Y.'"

Safeway prevents stolen carts by having an electronic field around its premises that will lock the brakes of a shopping cart if it goes past its boundary, said manager Sam Coolbaugh.

Some people, however, are so cart-crazed they will carry them, Coolbaugh said.

"It always kinds of mystifies me someone would want to pick up a cart and carry it," he said.

Safeway stores with neighboring hotels, motels and apartments tend to use the electronic boundary.

In Douglas County, it's a misdemeanor to take a shopping cart off the store's premises, according to sheriff's Sgt. Tom Mezzetta.

"Occasionally people use it to cart things home," Mezzetta said.

Bob Albertazzi, senior community resource officer with the South Lake Tahoe Police Department, said there is no city ordinance against taking a shopping cart, but he said it is a state law.

"We don't get involved unless the store calls us and says there is a theft (of a cart)," he said.