Le drive

In France, what we Americans call a "drive-through" at retail establishments is known as un drive. Whether it's fast food, a pharmacy, or a supermarket, the signs for le drive are everywhere. Except at banks. I don't think there are drive-up tellers at French banks. Not sure about drive-up ATMs, but I can't think of one. On Friday, I did the supermarket drive for the first time.

This is not our Super-U and it's not my photo. I got the image from the internet.

"Location" means "rental," most supermarkets offer cars and vans for rent. "Courses" means "shopping."

Ken put together our order on line. Both our local supermarkets, Intermarché and Super-U, offer the service. Since normally we each enjoy going food shopping, we've never used le drive. But, like a whole lot of other folks, we decided to try it to minimize public contact in this time of confinement. That first week, the web sites were inundated and things didn't seem to work right. But that all calmed down after a while. Ken placed the order and selected Friday morning between 09h30 and 10h00 for pickup.

When I drove to the drive, I noticed a few things. First, there were many fewer cars on the road than normal. Second, the recycling stations along the way were closed, taped off with red and white police tape. And while I was expecting the local gendarmes to be checking people for their attestation forms, I saw none. I got to the supermarket and they buzzed me in through the gate to the drive station in back of the store. They were ready for me.

First, however, there were a couple of substitutions. Ken ordered a pain de mie (a loaf of unsliced sandwich bread), but they didn't have one, so they gave me a sliced boule (a round loaf) instead. No problem. He had also ordered a cleaning product which they were out of, so they substituted another brand. Again, no problem. I noticed that there were no baguettes in the box when there should have been a bag of four (for the price of three!). The staff double checked the order and, sure enough, they missed that, so they went back in to get it.

When I got home and unpacked, Ken noticed that instead of the ten bottles of red wine he ordered, we only got five. But the receipt showed we were charged for ten. He called the market and they happily, and without question, gave us a store credit for that. I'm sure the supermarket staff are pretty stressed with the sudden increase in drive orders, the fact that they have to wear masks and gloves, along with the worry of being infected. Given all that, I think our experience was relatively painless and positive. We're planning to try out the other supermarket drive near us next time.

After the supermarket, I went to the pharmacy. No problems there. They filled my expired prescriptions as I read they were authorized to do. The only difference in the store were the tape markings on the floor to keep people a meter apart in line. But there was no line, I was one of two customers while I was there.

UPDATE: I just heard on the morning news that they've opened the first drive-through testing site for the coronavirus in Paris. They call it le drive-test.